A tool to improve prediction of real time environmental risk to UK rail infrastructure

Lead Research Organisation: University of Southampton
Department Name: School of Geography

Abstract

Safety performance of the UK railways has improved significantly in recent decades, though over the same period costs have also increased, resulting in an efficiency gap between current industry costs and comparable railways elsewhere in Europe (McNulty 2011). This gap can be partly attributed to the use of overly conservative safety standards, with the potential to be replaced by calculated risk controls accompanied by appropriate risk modelling and assessment. By identifying low risk locations or routes and areas where the risk controls deliver little or no additional safety benefit, the industry could achieve significant cost and efficiency savings through the removal of unnecessary/over-prescriptive control measures (Griffin & Holloway 2012).

The proposed research will deliver a model and toolkit to improve prediction of risk to rail infrastructure using environmental information, including weather conditions in real time or, historically, according to user specified scenarios. This adds several new dimensions to RSSB's Safety Risk Model (SRM) and thus provides significant potential to improve risk calculations and controls and provide cost efficiencies for managing the safety of the UK rail infrastructure.

The proposed research identifies clear potential advantages to the RSSB stakeholder, who stand to benefit from a much improved Safety Risk Model, taking environmental factors into account. Such benefits would be shared with other rail industry stakeholders, including Network Rail, Department of Transport and other researchers, all informing government rail safety policy, investment and spending decisions.

If successful, the developed tool has the potential to be "disruptive", changing "business as usual" practices at the RSSB stakeholder and related rail infrastructure organisations. The tool can provide the introduction of real-time environmental safety risk modelling which has not previously been available in the UK, or reported to be in place elsewhere.

Publications

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Kit O An online tool for assessment of environmental risk to GB rail infrastructure

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Sadler J (2016) GeoSRM - Online geospatial safety risk model for the GB rail network in IET Intelligent Transport Systems

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Sadler J D (2017) A tool to predict environmental risk to GB rail infrastructure in Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers

 
Description The project began with a review of relevant existing research, including meetings with a number of rail industry stakeholders and academic partners and projects. A survey was undertaken of potential environmental data, assessing usefulness, accessibility, spatial/temporal resolution and extent, as well as problems and limitations presented by their insufficiency.

The environmental component of rail risk is a combination of a range of factors and their interaction in time and space. Current research agrees that soil type, soil moisture deficit and rainfall intensity are key environmental variables affecting rail safety, particularly in relation to derailment. This data is readily available to researchers at sufficiently high spatial and temporal resolution for the UK, providing the potential to test this research.

The development component of the project set out to integrate high resolution precipitation data, long-term climatic averages and soil parent material data, with location data for tracks, assets (hard and soft structures including embankments, cuttings, retaining walls, culverts, bridges, crossings, viaducts and tunnels) and incidents. This could be tested for the whole of the UK, while within the Wessex route (the existing safety risk model pilot) there was the additional availability of modelled derailment risk, which could be combined with the environmental data to deliver improved on-the-fly risk calculations of derailment risk for the region, with potential for future nationwide extension.

The concept and methodology was developed into a specification for an extensible architecture and toolkit, which could be demonstrated to and validated by key researchers and stakeholders. The prototype application presents a user-controlled toolkit that obtains 5-minute precipitation grids (NIMROD), computes 5-day cumulative precipitation of every 5x5 km area within the UK, then computes rainfall exceedance or shortfall in relation to monthly long-time averages (UKCP09). This result is then combined with soil clay content (British Geological Survey) and ultimately yields a risk coefficient overlaid with the rail network or combined with rail risk model data.

The prototype was presented to a number of industry and academic stakeholders, identifying areas for potential development, possibly in partnership with industry.
Exploitation Route The research basis and data were developed into a methodology, extensible architecture and a prototype toolkit that could be further developed and scaled up in a number of ways for wide application in the rail industry.

The research outcomes have identified clear potential benefits to Network Rail, RSSB and other industry stakeholders, all concerned with making the rail network resilient to environmental risk and targeting investment (and preventive measures) effectively for efficient management of infrastructure.

Benefits could be realised further by applying the same concept outside of the UK, depending on availability of environmental data. Potential has also been identified for using the same tools and techniques for roads and initial discussions had with safety risk modellers within the Highways England.
Sectors Aerospace, Defence and Marine,Digital/Communication/Information Technologies (including Software),Environment,Transport
URL http://www.geodata.soton.ac.uk/geodata/web/project214
 
Description The supporting GeoSRM prototype is undergoing extensive stakeholder piloting by RSSB and Network Rail with around 30 industry and research partners, including exposure to the environmental data extension. This will yield substantial feedback and provide a roadmap for future development. There is potential positive impact for the travelling public. Landslips can cause closure of some routes which, depending on the location can mean isolation of some populations, eg when sea washed away track at Dawlish the route was closed for two months, the Cleethorpes-Doncaster route was closed for 11 weeks because of subsidence. Initial metric-based estimation of potential safety benefits have been derived from the GB Rail industry's Safety Risk Model. Other than quantitative safety benefits, there are other potential positive impacts, eg performance (reduction in delay minutes, cancellations of services), reduction in knock-on damage to other infrastructure assets, eg track, track bed, signalling etc., greater efficiency in resource allocation/siting.
First Year Of Impact 2015
Sector Transport
Impact Types Policy & public services
 
Title GeoSRM Environmental Risk Toolkit 
Description The project research basis was developed into a methodology, extensible architecture and a prototype toolkit, which could be scaled up in a number of ways for wide application in the rail industry. The toolkit can be effectively used by experts and non-experts alike and provides useful insight into historic and live patterns of slope failure risk across the UK, with the results accessible through any standards-compliant web browser. 
Type Of Material Improvements to research infrastructure 
Year Produced 2015 
Provided To Others? Yes  
Impact RSSB are gathering stakeholder feedback before deciding on the scope and specification for any further development. Research teams and projects within the University of Southampton Transport Research Group are in discussions to re-use the toolkit for other ongoing projects. Potential has been identified for using the same tools and techniques for roads and initial discussions had with safety risk modellers within the Highways Agency. 
URL http://www.geodata.soton.ac.uk/geodata/web/project214
 
Title Environmental Risk methodology, data architecture and live database 
Description An extensible geospatial architecture and live database for retrieving, transforming, combining and delivering a range of environmental data sources related to rail risk, including: - Cumulative precipitation over the last 5 days as calculated from 5-minute NIMROD grids (source: MetOffice, hosted by CEDA for BADC) - Exceedance of cumulative precipitation over long-term monthly climatic averages provided by UKCP09 - Prevalence of clay as soil parent material (source: BGS) - High precision railway track vector geometry (source: Network Rail) - Rail asset, incident and risk data (Source: RSSB, GeoSRM funded by UK DfT ; Safety Management Information System (SMIS)) 
Type Of Material Data handling & control 
Year Produced 2015 
Provided To Others? Yes  
Impact Other research collaborators are interested in re-using the methodology, architecture and data for further research. Highways England are in discussion with applying and extending the same techniques within a road network model. 
URL http://www.geodata.soton.ac.uk/geodata/web/project214
 
Description GeoSRM Academic, Research and Innovation partners 
Organisation British Geological Survey
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution Meetings were held with and presentations delivered to a range of academic, research and innovation partners at the above and other Institutions engaged in research on environmental impacts to transport and rail infrastructure. These included specific research groups and ongoing and recent funded research projects, e.g. iSMART project (Infrastructure slopes Sustainable Management And Resilience Assessment, EPSRC Funded) and members of the FutureNet programme (Future Resilient Transport Networks, various funders).
Collaborator Contribution Partners provided input to the project in a number of ways, including feedback on the basic concepts being addressed, specific research and model input, and assistance in specifying the GeoSRM environmental risk extensions. Innovation partners shared data sources and have been involved in discussions on collaborating on future research in this field.
Impact The collaboration played a major part in achieving the deliverables to the GeoSRM environmental risk project, including a research basis for the models and concepts employed. Partners provided a test group of users for prototyping early versions of the interface and access to other relevant university academics and visitors to present project outputs to. The collarobation is multi-disciplinary, including expertise on Computer and Data Science, Transport, Safety Risk Modelling, Geotechnical Engineering, Geology and Environment.
Start Year 2014
 
Description GeoSRM Academic, Research and Innovation partners 
Organisation KnowNow Information Limited
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Private 
PI Contribution Meetings were held with and presentations delivered to a range of academic, research and innovation partners at the above and other Institutions engaged in research on environmental impacts to transport and rail infrastructure. These included specific research groups and ongoing and recent funded research projects, e.g. iSMART project (Infrastructure slopes Sustainable Management And Resilience Assessment, EPSRC Funded) and members of the FutureNet programme (Future Resilient Transport Networks, various funders).
Collaborator Contribution Partners provided input to the project in a number of ways, including feedback on the basic concepts being addressed, specific research and model input, and assistance in specifying the GeoSRM environmental risk extensions. Innovation partners shared data sources and have been involved in discussions on collaborating on future research in this field.
Impact The collaboration played a major part in achieving the deliverables to the GeoSRM environmental risk project, including a research basis for the models and concepts employed. Partners provided a test group of users for prototyping early versions of the interface and access to other relevant university academics and visitors to present project outputs to. The collarobation is multi-disciplinary, including expertise on Computer and Data Science, Transport, Safety Risk Modelling, Geotechnical Engineering, Geology and Environment.
Start Year 2014
 
Description GeoSRM Academic, Research and Innovation partners 
Organisation Remote Sensing Applications Consultants (RSAC) Ltd.
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Private 
PI Contribution Meetings were held with and presentations delivered to a range of academic, research and innovation partners at the above and other Institutions engaged in research on environmental impacts to transport and rail infrastructure. These included specific research groups and ongoing and recent funded research projects, e.g. iSMART project (Infrastructure slopes Sustainable Management And Resilience Assessment, EPSRC Funded) and members of the FutureNet programme (Future Resilient Transport Networks, various funders).
Collaborator Contribution Partners provided input to the project in a number of ways, including feedback on the basic concepts being addressed, specific research and model input, and assistance in specifying the GeoSRM environmental risk extensions. Innovation partners shared data sources and have been involved in discussions on collaborating on future research in this field.
Impact The collaboration played a major part in achieving the deliverables to the GeoSRM environmental risk project, including a research basis for the models and concepts employed. Partners provided a test group of users for prototyping early versions of the interface and access to other relevant university academics and visitors to present project outputs to. The collarobation is multi-disciplinary, including expertise on Computer and Data Science, Transport, Safety Risk Modelling, Geotechnical Engineering, Geology and Environment.
Start Year 2014
 
Description GeoSRM Academic, Research and Innovation partners 
Organisation University of Oxford
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution Meetings were held with and presentations delivered to a range of academic, research and innovation partners at the above and other Institutions engaged in research on environmental impacts to transport and rail infrastructure. These included specific research groups and ongoing and recent funded research projects, e.g. iSMART project (Infrastructure slopes Sustainable Management And Resilience Assessment, EPSRC Funded) and members of the FutureNet programme (Future Resilient Transport Networks, various funders).
Collaborator Contribution Partners provided input to the project in a number of ways, including feedback on the basic concepts being addressed, specific research and model input, and assistance in specifying the GeoSRM environmental risk extensions. Innovation partners shared data sources and have been involved in discussions on collaborating on future research in this field.
Impact The collaboration played a major part in achieving the deliverables to the GeoSRM environmental risk project, including a research basis for the models and concepts employed. Partners provided a test group of users for prototyping early versions of the interface and access to other relevant university academics and visitors to present project outputs to. The collarobation is multi-disciplinary, including expertise on Computer and Data Science, Transport, Safety Risk Modelling, Geotechnical Engineering, Geology and Environment.
Start Year 2014
 
Description GeoSRM Academic, Research and Innovation partners 
Organisation University of Southampton
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution Meetings were held with and presentations delivered to a range of academic, research and innovation partners at the above and other Institutions engaged in research on environmental impacts to transport and rail infrastructure. These included specific research groups and ongoing and recent funded research projects, e.g. iSMART project (Infrastructure slopes Sustainable Management And Resilience Assessment, EPSRC Funded) and members of the FutureNet programme (Future Resilient Transport Networks, various funders).
Collaborator Contribution Partners provided input to the project in a number of ways, including feedback on the basic concepts being addressed, specific research and model input, and assistance in specifying the GeoSRM environmental risk extensions. Innovation partners shared data sources and have been involved in discussions on collaborating on future research in this field.
Impact The collaboration played a major part in achieving the deliverables to the GeoSRM environmental risk project, including a research basis for the models and concepts employed. Partners provided a test group of users for prototyping early versions of the interface and access to other relevant university academics and visitors to present project outputs to. The collarobation is multi-disciplinary, including expertise on Computer and Data Science, Transport, Safety Risk Modelling, Geotechnical Engineering, Geology and Environment.
Start Year 2014
 
Description GeoSRM Industry Stakeholders 
Organisation Department of Transport
Department Highways Agency
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Public 
PI Contribution The research team worked closely with the industry stakeholders and partners to develop the methodology and scope of the project from an industry and user perspective, presenting specifications and demonstrations to key experts as the project progressed as well as a presentation of the final system to key stakeholders and the inclusion of the environmental risk toolkit within RSSB testing of the GeoSRM system with all potential users.
Collaborator Contribution RSSB partners provided base data sets, such as rail asset, risk and incident data. RSSB and Network Rail partners provided expertise and data on earthworks, geotechnical engineering and on the impact of weather on rail risk. Highways Agency partners provided a perspective and specification of user requirements for applying the concepts and techniques within a road network setting, an area under continued discussion with them.
Impact The outputs of the project are a direct results of these collaborations, a GeoSRM environmental risk model and toolkit demonstrator, underpinned by a multi TB database of rail risk and weather data and architecture for retreiving, combining and visualisation of environmental data. The collarobation is multi-disciplinary, including expertise on IT, Transport, Safety Risk Modelling, Geotechnical Engineering, Geology and Environment.
Start Year 2014
 
Description GeoSRM Industry Stakeholders 
Organisation Network Rail Ltd
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Private 
PI Contribution The research team worked closely with the industry stakeholders and partners to develop the methodology and scope of the project from an industry and user perspective, presenting specifications and demonstrations to key experts as the project progressed as well as a presentation of the final system to key stakeholders and the inclusion of the environmental risk toolkit within RSSB testing of the GeoSRM system with all potential users.
Collaborator Contribution RSSB partners provided base data sets, such as rail asset, risk and incident data. RSSB and Network Rail partners provided expertise and data on earthworks, geotechnical engineering and on the impact of weather on rail risk. Highways Agency partners provided a perspective and specification of user requirements for applying the concepts and techniques within a road network setting, an area under continued discussion with them.
Impact The outputs of the project are a direct results of these collaborations, a GeoSRM environmental risk model and toolkit demonstrator, underpinned by a multi TB database of rail risk and weather data and architecture for retreiving, combining and visualisation of environmental data. The collarobation is multi-disciplinary, including expertise on IT, Transport, Safety Risk Modelling, Geotechnical Engineering, Geology and Environment.
Start Year 2014
 
Description GeoSRM Industry Stakeholders 
Organisation Rail Safety and Standards Board
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Public 
PI Contribution The research team worked closely with the industry stakeholders and partners to develop the methodology and scope of the project from an industry and user perspective, presenting specifications and demonstrations to key experts as the project progressed as well as a presentation of the final system to key stakeholders and the inclusion of the environmental risk toolkit within RSSB testing of the GeoSRM system with all potential users.
Collaborator Contribution RSSB partners provided base data sets, such as rail asset, risk and incident data. RSSB and Network Rail partners provided expertise and data on earthworks, geotechnical engineering and on the impact of weather on rail risk. Highways Agency partners provided a perspective and specification of user requirements for applying the concepts and techniques within a road network setting, an area under continued discussion with them.
Impact The outputs of the project are a direct results of these collaborations, a GeoSRM environmental risk model and toolkit demonstrator, underpinned by a multi TB database of rail risk and weather data and architecture for retreiving, combining and visualisation of environmental data. The collarobation is multi-disciplinary, including expertise on IT, Transport, Safety Risk Modelling, Geotechnical Engineering, Geology and Environment.
Start Year 2014
 
Description GeoSRM Industry Stakeholders 
Organisation Rail Safety and Standards Board
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Public 
PI Contribution The research team worked closely with the industry stakeholders and partners to develop the methodology and scope of the project from an industry and user perspective, presenting specifications and demonstrations to key experts as the project progressed as well as a presentation of the final system to key stakeholders and the inclusion of the environmental risk toolkit within RSSB testing of the GeoSRM system with all potential users.
Collaborator Contribution RSSB partners provided base data sets, such as rail asset, risk and incident data. RSSB and Network Rail partners provided expertise and data on earthworks, geotechnical engineering and on the impact of weather on rail risk. Highways Agency partners provided a perspective and specification of user requirements for applying the concepts and techniques within a road network setting, an area under continued discussion with them.
Impact The outputs of the project are a direct results of these collaborations, a GeoSRM environmental risk model and toolkit demonstrator, underpinned by a multi TB database of rail risk and weather data and architecture for retreiving, combining and visualisation of environmental data. The collarobation is multi-disciplinary, including expertise on IT, Transport, Safety Risk Modelling, Geotechnical Engineering, Geology and Environment.
Start Year 2014
 
Title GeoSRM Environmental Risk Architecture and Prototype 
Description The research basis of the project and open environmental data sources acquired were developed into an extensible software architecture, implementing the devised methodology (as documented in publications) and a prototype toolkit allowing users to explore historic and live patterns of environmental data and their affect on derailment risk, accessible through a standard web browser. 
Type Of Technology Webtool/Application 
Year Produced 2015 
Impact The tool enabled industry experts and stakeholders to explore data and risk dynamically with the results shown through live web-mapping interfaces. There is no other tool, to our knowledge, which allows this level of integration or numerous data sources and insight in this field. 
URL http://www.geodata.soton.ac.uk/geodata/web/project214
 
Description Highways England presentation 
Form Of Engagement Activity A talk or presentation
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Policymakers/politicians
Results and Impact Remote presentations to Safety Risk Model team within Highways England, including detailed discussions of the project and the scope of a pilot development applying the same techniques to the UK road network.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2015
 
Description Network Rail presentations 
Form Of Engagement Activity A talk or presentation
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Policymakers/politicians
Results and Impact Separate presentations to senior Network Rail staff, visiting the University of Southampton, including Chief Engineer, Chief Rail Technology Officer and Senior Engineer. Discussion on the scope of the project for future use in everyday rail practice, potential for including live incident data. Contacts made for future discussions.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2015
 
Description Presentation to iSMART project meeting 
Form Of Engagement Activity A talk or presentation
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact Presentation to quarterly iSMART (Infrastructure slopes Sustainable Management And Resilience Assessment, EPSRC funded) project on rail research with respect to slope geophysics. Live demonstration of prototype system and in-depth discussion of models and methodology behind the development and the project. Various contacts made with project partners for future research and specific input to the development.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2015
 
Description RSSB Innovation and Collaboration Ingenuity event 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach Regional
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact Participation and presentation at round table event sharing rail research innovations and discussing future directions. Discussions with Network Rail safety teams.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2015
 
Description Rail Research Association UK (RRUKA) Conference 2014 
Form Of Engagement Activity A talk or presentation
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact Conference presentation of the GeoSRM project and initial environmental risk extensions. Discussion panel following presentation, taking questions from the audience. Several new leads and contacts generated in rail and road risk industry.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2014
 
Description Rail Research Association UK (RRUKA) Conference 2015 
Form Of Engagement Activity A talk or presentation
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact Demonstrations of GeoSRM Environmental Risk toolkit as part of University of Southampton rail research presence. Demonstrations given to many industry and research stakeholders as well as rail industry media contacts. Further discussions made with a number of individuals and contacts ongoing.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2015