The Rail Engineer - Issue 89 - March 2012

March 2012

i s s u e

89 Signalling for the future NETWORK RAIL ANNOUNCES £1.5 BILLION FRAMEWORK AGREEMENTS

Telecommunicating Today

Paris Metro Line 1

Showing your gauge

New Network Rail Telecoms Director Andy Hudson, speaks to Clive Kessell.

Unattended Train Operation (UTO) with no member of staff on board.

The growth of the network gauge-cleared for High Cube Containers is very visible.

written by rail engineers for rail engineers

available online at www.therailengineer.com

march 2012 | the rail engineer | 3

welcome Grahame Taylor’s

Operating notice This being the rail engineer’s signalling edition, we lead with interviews with four leading signalling protagonists. Nigel Wordsworth has had the signalling framework contracts explained along with reactions from the successful tenderers. A word keeps cropping up - ‘stability’.

The first in Clive Kessell’s tetrology this month is an interview with Network Rail’s telecoms supremo, Andy Hudson. With a sound background in railway telecoms, Andy is taking the company forward to cater for the current and future demands of the railway network and passengers.

In a glorious mix of high and low technology, Clive looks at the use of optical time domain reflectometers to detect rock falls. Their possible use in a railway environment has prompted spectacular trials involving lobbing artificial boulders at a simulated railway.

Over on the Paris Metro they have introduced UTO on Line 1. When you realise that UTO stands for Unattended Train Operation and that the Line 1 infrastructure dates back to 1900 and that at the start of the project there was no proven UTO system, it’s clear that this was indeed an ambitious exercise.

Completing Clive’s tour de force is his coverage of a recent seminar on managing interfaces. This is fundamental stuff. If you want a project to go well then engage all the engineering and operating disciplines at the outset and don’t be surprised at how many interfaces you encounter.

People/vehicles and trains don’t mix and a level crossing is where they all can congregate. So it’s extraordinary that the default position of some user organisations is to object to a closure even when it’s an eminently good idea. We talk to Network Rail’s head of level crossings and find that so often it’s about people and their behaviour.

Nigel, along with an ashen-faced gathering at the Rail Innovation and Development Centre, was

treated to the spectacle of a 28 tonne road/railer powerless to stop on greasy rails. The need to modify braking systems was amply demonstrated.

After a crash course - perhaps an unfortunate phrase after his road rail experience - in Swedish, Nigel went to look at the Gröna Tåget (Green Train).

It’s more of a concept than an actual train at the moment. But just look at the practicalities needed to make a train function in severe Nordic conditions and it becomes all the more ambitious to then start addressing ‘green’ issues on top.

They’ll be everywhere soon. The high cube 9’6” containers are on the march. Not everywhere perhaps. There are still some significant lumps of railway infrastructure in the way, but as Mungo Stacy tells us, the growth of the network gaugecleared for high cube containers is a very visible indication of the investment in rail freight.

David Shirres has been to the National Railway Museum to absorb the history of the Institution of Locomotive Engineers (IMechE’s Railway Division).

The exhibition “Talking about Trains” abounds with references to such titans as Gresley, Stanier and Bulleid. But, history aside, the organisation has moved quickly into the internet age.

Chris Parker looks at the Bletchley re-modelling.

Originally part of the West Coast Route Modernisation project, it was revised as a simpler, more cost effective scheme. Nevertheless, the scope is still ambitious, with completion not due until June 2013.

In complete contrast, Chris gives a fascinating insight into how the alignment of a railway influences its reaction to underlying geology. This seems to work in the southern part of Britain which is dominated by various forms of slippery splodge (technical term) but not in the North which sits on rock. He also dispels the myth that trees on a cutting slope are a ‘good thing’. So the Railway Children film was right after all!

Editor Grahame Taylor grahame.taylor@therailengineer.com

the rail engineer Ashby House, Bath Street, Ashby-de-la-Zouch Leicestershire, LE65 2FH

Production and design Adam O'Connor adam@rail-media.com

Telephone: Fax: Email: Website:

Engineering writers chris.parker@therailengineer.com clive.kessell@therailengineer.com collin.carr@therailengineer.com david.shirres@therailengineer.com graeme.bickerdike@therailengineer.com mungo.stacy@therailengineer.com peter.stanton@therailengineer.com steve.bissell@therailengineer.com stuart.marsh@therailengineer.com stuart.rackley@therailengineer.com terry.whitley@therailengineer.com Advertising Asif Ahmed asif@rail-media.com Nigel Wordsworth nigel@rail-media.com Paul Curtis pc@rail-media.com

01530 56 00 31 01530 41 21 66 hello@rail-media.com www.therailengineer.com

Editorial copy Email: news@rail-media.com Free controlled circulation Email: subscribe@rail-media.com The small print the rail engineer is published by RailStaff Publications Limited and printed by Pensord.

in this issue

Signalling for the future Network Rail announces £1.5 billion Framework Agreements.

6

ERTMS reaches Croatia 16 The first railway line to be equipped with ERTMS.

Levelling on Crossings Grahame Taylor speaks with Martin Gallagher, Network Rail’s Head of Level Crossings.

24

Paris Metro Line 1 - A New Beginning 28 Having no member of staff on a train carries a new set of risks, all of which have to be considered.

Showing your gauge 34 The growth of the network gauge-cleared for High Cube Containers is a very visible indication of the investment in rail freight.

Ingenuity at the Interface 38 Interfaces are a known problem, but could they be managed better if an inter-disciplinary approach were to be adopted.

Preventing runaways 41 All Class 9b excavators have to be fitted with a braking system that acts directly on the rail wheels.

Managing Earthworks 44 Network Rail’s Senior Asset Engineer (Geotechnics) Graham Birch, explains some of the measures to monitor and manage embankments.

© All rights reserved. No part of this magazine may be reproduced in any form without the prior written permission of the copyright owners.

forthcoming

features

Sister publication of Infrarail Show Special; Environment

April

Rolling Stock/Depots; Track

May

4 | the rail engineer | march 2012

IN BRIEF More tube cooling Work to improve London’s rail infrastructure in time for the Olympics continues apace. Latest announcement is a plan to cool six platforms at Oxford Circus underground station.

Birse Metro has been awarded a contract to install a new water cooling system. Chiller units will be installed on the roof, and the cooled water piped down, using existing ventilation ducts, to a new plant room which will be constructed and fitted out within Western House. From there the chilled water will be pumped down to 14 Passenger Air Handling Units at platform level.

news

STATIONS

Blackfriars is back

Safety Director to address Safety Summit Gareth Llewellyn, Network Rail’s Director Safety and Sustainable Development, has been confirmed as a key speaker at this year’s Rail Safety Summit. Now in its third year, the Rail Safety Summit will be held on Thursday 19 April at Loughborough University, and Gareth adds to a line-up of speakers from organisations such as FirstGroup, Transport for London, ORR, Southern Railway, Bridgeway Consulting, Target Leadership, Emergency Incident Consultant Willie Baker and Zonegreen.

A larger and more accessible Blackfriars Underground station reopened for public service recently to accommodate more than 40,000 passengers every day. The 60% increase in footfall follows the redevelopment of Blackfriars Underground station which has been completely rebuilt over three years.

New lifts and escalators make the station easier to access and a curved glass façade floods the spacious new entrance hall with natural light.

The upgrade is the latest in a series of improvements that are tripling the number of trains that run through Blackfriars on the Thameslink route each hour.

The new Underground station is part of a complete redevelopment of both the Tube and national rail parts of Blackfriars stations by Network Rail. Mainline platforms for national rail services now span the River Thames on a reconstructed Victorian rail bridge, making way for

longer trains on the Thameslink route through central London. The station can also now be accessed from the south bank of the river and a new entrance hall on the north bank provides convenient access to both Thameslink and London Underground services.

The project has also provided jobs for 13,000 people over the last three years, with 2,000 people working on the site each day at the busiest times.

CONFERENCE

Infrarail comes together Now widely recognised as the principal conference on rail safety, the line-up of speakers will be sure to attract a full audience. For more details, visit www.railsafetysummit.com.

IEP depot approved The much-delayed IEP programme took another step towards fruition recently as planning permission has been approved for a depot at Stoke Gifford, close to Bristol Parkway station.

Approval is for a depot that will be able to house two full-length trains, as well as associated offices and sidings.

Local residents had fought a campaign to have the planning application rejected, but South Gloucestershire council approved the plans. Work is expected to start this summer, although the formal order for IEP trains has yet to be placed by the DfT. A spokesman said that completion of the formalities is expected by “spring 2012”.

The number of companies planning to take part in this year’s Infrarail exhibition of rail infrastructure products and services stood at more than 160 by midFebruary, with plenty of new products expected to be on display and innovation promising to be a key feature of the event.

The NEC in Birmingham is again the venue for the exhibition, which takes place from 1st to 3rd May. Online registration for free visitor entry is now open via the show website www.infrarail.com Preregistering also avoids a £15 fee payable to register on the door.

As well as an impressive line-up of exhibitors’ stands, this year’s show includes the familiar On Track Display plus a new area, The Yard, presenting larger plant and machinery used for railway construction and maintenance.

And opportunities for developing business relationships will be provided by the opening day’s Networking Reception for exhibitors and visitors to the show, and by the Infrarail Awards Dinner

on 2 May. Plans for an extensive free seminar programme devised by the rail engineer are now well advanced, with an impressive line-up of keynote speakers. Minister of State for Transport Theresa Villiers will deliver a presentation on the first day of the show, with Howard Smith, Chief Operating Officer, London Rail at Transport for London, speaking on 2 May. Network Rail’s Director, Investment Projects, Simon Kirby will be keynote speaker on the third day, 3 May.

Also taking place, and open to all attending Infrarail, will be The Platform. This new feature will take the form of a programme of panel discussions addressing key industry topics. Panel members will include both senior figures from within the industry and outside specialists likely to introduce new perspectives to the issues being discussed.

Full programmes for all these activities will be added to the show website as they are finalised. Also available via the website is the latest list of exhibitors.

9th International Railway Infrastructure Exhibition

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6 | the rail engineer | march 2012

signalling/telecoms writer

Nigel

Wordsworth

Signalling

for the future The facts

RAIL ANNOUNCES £1.5 N ETWORK BILLION FRAMEWORK AGREEMENTS. That was the title of a press release received in the Ashby offices of the rail engineer in the middle of January.

This seemed like extremely good news for the industry, at least for the three companies involved. There was obviously a story behind this release, so your favourite railway engineering magazine got on its bike (or the 08:32 from East Midlands Parkway) and set out to discover more.

The first objective was to uncover the facts behind the announcement, and Mark Southwell, Network Rail’s Programme Director (Signalling), seemed a good person to help with that.

To start with, the three contracts that have been let are zero-value framework agreements. This is commonly the way it is done. The framework is just what it says, a framework on which other orders and contracts are built. Those contracts have the value, not the framework, and it is the total of those expected orders over the next seven years that are expected to total £1.5 billion.

Secondly, the framework is actually only for two years, with an option to renew for a further five. This is because the budgets for CP5 haven’t yet been set, and Network Rail cannot technically commit itself to spending money it hasn’t got. However, this is a technicality and the intention is that the framework will run until the next period end in 2019.

If you, dear reader, are not a signal engineer, and get slightly confused while reading signalling articles as they are packed full of acronyms and jargon, you will be pleased to hear that signalling contracts are no different. In an attempt to “simplify” pricing, they use the Signalling Equivalent Unit (SEU) concept. This is a method of breaking down a job into the hardware it contains, such as interlockings, point controls, signals and level crossings, and then calculating those into a number of Signalling Equivalent Units. The cost per SEU is then fairly constant, and can be used to calculate the value of the whole job. Back in 2006, Network Rail was using a value of £270,000 per SEU and the goal is to reduce this.

The contractors based their quotations on the cost per SEU, and to “simplify” this even further, they used four versions of an SEU: • Type 1 - a complete multi-disciplinary contract • Type 2 - Signalling only • Type 3 - Modular signalling • Type 4 - Relocking.

Add to this a discount or premium depending on the job’s location - a job near a main road is cheaper to do than one in the middle of a Scottish moor - and you have a “simple” basis on which to calculate the cost of any signalling job.

Based on quoted prices per SEU, as well as other factors, three contractors were chosen to supply Network Rail with the bulk of its signalling requirements over the period of the framework. This is not new work, it is the signalling replacement and renewal work that would have happened anyway, but the framework will allow the contractors to make long-term efficiency savings and these will be passed on to Network Rail in the form of reduced prices per SEU. Every job still has to be priced. However, with the price per SEU already fixed by the framework agreement, this will come down to a calculation of the number of SEUs in any job and the value of the non-SEU work.

There will be no need for the slow, and potentially expensive, conventional tendering process.

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signalling/telecoms

Partnership

Signalling Solutions

There will be other benefits too, as Mark explained: “We intend to work in partnership with our suppliers. This will smooth out the peaks and troughs that normally occur in the business, allowing us to plan a more constant workload for our suppliers.”

The framework is split down into eight geographical areas, with each area having a primary and secondary supplier. Normally, the primary will do all the work in that region, but if they are unable to do a job for any reason, such as lack of capacity, then the secondary contractor will be asked to step in.

Network Rail still reserves the right to put a job out to competitive tender. This will be done from time to time to assess price competitiveness in the market, and for other reasons. However, even major work will fall within the scope of the framework. Mark Southwell commented that the recent contracts covering Cardiff, Nottingham, Glasgow and Wolverhampton would have gone to the framework contractors if the agreement had been in place at the time.

Asked whether this new arrangement was a reaction to the recent McNulty report on delivering a better value railway, Mark commented: “Network Rail knew it had to drive through efficiencies long before McNulty’s report came out, as the regulator had set us a target of delivering a 24% efficiency improvement in CP4. The McNulty report highlighted the challenges we face, and focussed thinking on the need to reduce costs, but this programme was already underway, as are other similar projects.”

The three recipients of the new framework are very different companies. Signalling Solutions Limited (SSL), Atkins and Invensys will share the work on a geographical basis as shown in the table. How will the new arrangement affect them?

The joint venture company of Signalling Solutions was formed in 2007. Alstom had been a supplier of signalling technology to the railway industry for years, but in a first attempt at rationalisation Network Rail had suggested that Alstom signalling in the UK should have turnkey capabilities, including installation and testing. This was a capability that Alstom had lost when it sold its 51% stake in infrastructure company GTRM to partner Carillion in 2001. Looking around the market, a best match was found in Balfour Beatty Rail, which at the time was looking for a technology partner in order to maximise the potential of their project management and delivery skills. A joint venture - Signalling Solutions Ltd - was formed and based at Alstom’s Borehamwood plant and Balfour Beatty’s Derby offices.

Steve McLaren, Managing Director of SSL, met the rail engineer in his office at Borehamwood surrounded by packing cases - the whole company is about to move to new premises at Radlett. He remembered those early years of the joint venture.

“Network Rail was very supportive”, he recalled.

“Having pushed Alstom to make the change, we then very quickly received a couple of contracts so we could put the combined team into action. The extensive knowledge, experience and capability of both organisations, in terms of technology, design,

engineering, project management, installation and testing, form the basis of SSL today.

“Alstom are world leaders in signalling technologies such as ERTMS, CBTC and interlocking, whereas Balfour Beatty has an international reputation as civil engineering contractors and project managers. We have two very supportive parents.”

The company is certainly growing rapidly.

From those early times in 2007 it employed 330 in 2010. Last year it recruited an additional 100, and plans to do the same again in 2012.

“Things were quiet a year or so ago,” Steve remembers, “and we had to let a few people go. However, now the situation is much improved and we have our own people to work in specialist areas. We will use partners to cover any peak demands.”

With a current annual turnover of £80-90 million, what will the new framework mean to SSL? “Security” was Steve’s one-word

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answer. “The ability to plan a long-term workload and to retain good people. We have reinstated our graduate training programme, and are also taking on apprentices. We are trying to make SSL an attractive business to join - and the safest. Did you know we haven’t had a RIDDOR accident for three years?

“We also plan to invest in new technologies and tools to do things smarter and even safer.

Generic technology R&D will continue to be done by Alstom; where necessary SSL shall adapt that to the UK market. It is essential to keep introducing new technology into the UK and maintain a healthy portfolio, for our business and most importantly for the benefit of our customers.”

Atkins Another of the successful bidders is a very different company. John Martin is Regional Programme Director for Atkins, and the bid director for the new signalling framework.

“We don’t have any product of our own,” he freely admits. “That means we are not tied to a product line so we can choose the best. We

signalling/telecoms

can drive innovation forward and come up with the best engineering solution to suit the client - it gives us more flexibility.”

Atkins has been delivering major signalling contracts since the 1990s, and it is a significant part of the business. In terms of additional work, John doesn’t see much difference. “The three companies involved are the three most successful in the market anyway. Invensys is probably the biggest, and SSL have been successful recently due to their Smartlock product. So in terms of market share there probably is no big change.

“However, this contract will make us all more efficient. We will be able to cut down on tendering costs, and there will be economies of scale in various areas. Above all there will be stability which will give us the incentive to develop new technologies.”

On the face of it, one area of weakness in Atkins’ portfolio is modular signalling. Invensys are already nearing completion of a modular project at Shrewsbury-Crewe while SSL have one between Ely and Norwich. However, John refutes this: “We have done the initial designs, done the thought process, and new product has come on the market. Our project at Cardiff is all plug coupled and uses Frauscher axle counters, so we have used quite a lot of modular technology even though it is not strictly a modular project.”

Atkins has done a lot of signalling consultancy abroad. They are client-side consultants in Denmark, have been involved in projects in the USA, and have offices in the Middle East. John Martin sees the way forward to be the formation of strong strategic partnerships to deliver turnkey projects.

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Invensys The largest of the three suppliers in terms of the UK market, Invensys, probably had the most to lose from the division of work in the new arrangement. However, William Wilson, Commercial Director, doesn’t see it that way.

“Looking at the split of regions, and the work we know is coming up, we think we have approximately half of the market - that’s our best guess.”

He is happy with the geographical split too. “ For many years we’ve had a significant presence in Scotland and we’re pleased to be able to continue the excellent work with Network Rail in this area. Wales & West provides the opportunity for expansion and indeed our base in Chippenham is well placed geographically to support this area.

signalling/telecoms Framework area

Primary contractor

Secondary contractor

Scotland Central (west) Central (east) Wales & West Great Western (inner) Great Western (outer) Anglia & Kent Sussex & Wessex

Invensys Invensys SSL Invensys SSL SSL Atkins Atkins

SSL SSL Invensys SSL Invensys Invensys SSL Invensys

But by far the largest area in terms of workload is the Central West area, which will see the delivery of some of the most significant signalling projects in the UK during the lifetime of the frameworks.

Coupled with the Thameslink Key Output 2 Framework which we secured last year, we are delighted with our newly defined footprint”.

Invensys is a technology company, although it has its own project managers and deputies. Installation is conducted using agency staff under Invensys direct management, and testing is carried out by a mix of in-house and agency teams.

The new framework agreement will give the company the confidence to invest more in R&D. Will added, “The real benefit to us is stability. It will allow us to enter into longer-term partnership agreements, and pass that stability down the line. And as most of our products are made in the UK, it will give more security to our British manufacturing workforce.”

What follows?

So, all three contractors seem relatively content. As in any contract there are winners and losers; six

other organisations expressed an interest so they will be disappointed, but hopefully the new arrangement will allow Network Rail to achieve its efficiency improvements and cost savings, while delivering a better railway.

What comes next? Well, there are two more contracts to be announced shortly. The first is the ETCS framework. Three contractors (from a shortlist of six) will be selected to take ERTMS in the UK one stage further by building pilot schemes on the Hertford loop. Following that, two will be chosen to install live ERTMS systems on the Great Western and the East Coast Main Line by about 2018. An announcement on the first three is expected at the end of March.

Then in April, the new framework for Traffic Management will be revealed. Tenders went in at the end of January. This is the scheme to reduce all the signal boxes in the country to 14 signalling control centres by about 2025. The signalling portion of the work will form part of the signalling framework already announced, but this will be overlaid

by Traffic Management systems running at the control centres.

All three of the signalling framework winners have tendered for both contracts, along with several others. So once again there will be winners and losers.

And that will more or less set the scene for signalling for the next 15 years.

14 | the rail engineer | march 2012

signalling/telecoms

writer

Chris Parker

Re-modelling Bletchley the critical works completed by A mongst Network Rail and its suppliers over the Christmas period were those at Bletchley, a key location on the West Coast Main-line (WCML). Using the traditional possession of the fast and slow lines through the festive period from Christmas Eve through to 27 December 2011, two new signal gantries with four new signals were fitted and

commissioned, a new signal gantry structure was installed and major overhead line modifications completed.

The Bletchley project, of which the work just completed is a relatively small part, was originally part of the West Coast Route Modernisation (WCRM) project. The plan was to re-model and re-signal the whole of the Milton Keynes/Bletchley area. However, the Bletchley part of the scheme was not required to deliver the WCRM principal objective, which was to provide the infrastructure to support Virgin’s Very High

Frequency 2008 timetable. So the original Bletchley scope of work was rejected by Network Rail and the project team was asked to re-engineer the work and resubmit a proposal for a simpler and more cost effective scheme. The revised proposal was submitted and in June 2009 it was authorised based on a project estimate of £123 million.

New scope The approved scope was to renew life expired signalling and electrification equipment that essentially dates back to the 1960s, to remodel and realign the tracks to permit 125mph running on the up fast line at Bletchley South junction, to extend platforms at Bletchley station to allow for 12 car trains on platforms 4&5, to replace other life expired assets (including track, telecoms and control equipment) and to recover redundant assets. In addition, signalling control of this section of the WCML was to be moved from the Bletchley power signal box to Rugby SCC while the Bedford / Bletchley lines were to come under the control of Marston Vale SCC. A workstation to cover Bletchley had already been provided at Rugby SCC as a part of the WCRM works.

The delivery plan for the new scheme incorporated 8 main sequential stages in order to minimise the disruption to the existing railway operation. The first of these stages was completed at Christmas 2010, when contractor Amey Colas installed the last of 10 new point ends at new Drayton Road and Water Eaton junctions. This completed Amey Colas’ involvement with the project.

march 2012 | the rail engineer | 15

New contractors In late 2010 a further 6 contractors were appointed for the main body of the works.

Carillion was appointed to be the contractor for the track and electrification works.

Signalling and power works were awarded to Signalling Solutions Limited, telecoms to telent, control systems to GE Transportation Systems, civils works to the Buckingham Group and possession management to MDA. The project team are currently working towards stage 6 of the project, the major signalling stage that will deliver the final commissioning of the new signalling and power system and the re-control to Rugby and Marston Vale as already described. This stage is planned to take place under a nine day possession at Christmas 2012. The first four days will involve closure of all lines, followed by 5 days with only the slow lines closed.

The scale of the works planned meant that it will be imprudent to attempt everything in the Christmas 2012 closure, and the stages between stage 0 and stage 6 have been developed to advance as much work as possible into earlier pre agreed possession opportunities, thus minimising the effect on the operational railway. This included the Christmas 2011 works.

Towards 2012 2012 will contain a number of stages of work that will primarily focus on changes to track layouts in areas either away from the WCML or where these can be achieved with

minimal effect on day-to-day operations.

These will use the planned possessions at Easter and over the May bank holiday. The former will entail the renewal of Bletchley East junction, while the later possession will see the renewal of further S&C in the main running lines.

In parallel with these staged works, the track drainage system in the area is being extensively upgraded with the installation of 3,600m of new drainage, as it is essential when laying new track to ensure it is well drained.

The work at Bletchley station to extend platforms 4 & 5 will enable longer trains of up to 12 carriages. The new signalling design includes provision of bi-directional signalling through platform 5 and an associated turn-back facility clear of the slow lines, increasing operational flexibility at the station.

A loop line is to be provided for trains up to 775m long that will facilitate regulation, allow inspection of trains following hot axlebox detector alarms and provide a direct route for freight trains in either direction between the slow lines and the flyover.

The early completion of the increased line speed on the up fast through Bletchley South (completed January 2010) provided 125mph running through Bletchley on both fast lines.

Network Rail’s project manager, Chris Hurst, emphasised that the Christmas 2012 blockade will be the only WCML “disruptive” possession requested by the entire project.

He added that, so far the project is on

programme, within budget and has an excellent safety record. Work to date has had minimal disruption to the everyday operation of the railway Chris says that relations with all the train operators have been excellent, particularly with London Midland, who have been very co-operative and positive about the scheme.

There is a real enthusiasm to see the tired assets of the area replaced with modern equipment and an improved layout, allowing Network Rail and their customers to provide improved services to travellers and freight customers alike.

The scheme is due to be completed by June 2013.

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ERTMS reaches Croatia

first railway line in Croatia to be T heequipped with European Rail Traffic Management System (ERTMS) / European Train Control System (ETCS) technology has commenced operations in the central European state. As readers of the rail engineer will be aware after several articles on the subject, whilst initially a European Union backed initiative to improve crossborder system interoperability, the international standards of ERTMS are increasingly being adopted by train operators across the globe to improve efficiency, speeds and safety.

On 19 January 2012, commercial services commenced on the 33.5 km section of the Pan European Corridor X from Vinkovci to Tovarnik, following installation of an INTERFLO 250 ERTMS/ETCS system by Bombardier Rail Control Solutions.

INTERFLO 250 is an ERTMS/ETCS Level 1 solution for main lines (SIL4). This solution comprises all the trackside products required for the route and also includes the Automatic Train Protection (ATP) as well as the ATP system on board the train. It is commonly applied as an overlay to existing national ATP networks providing higher levels of safety, but providing an economical migration and early experience with ERTMS Level 1 technology.

Once the full corridor has been implemented the trade benefits could be significant for Croatia, facilitating considerably shorter journey times for freight transport on the East-West corridor and encouraging a modal shift in favour of rail.

The upgrade of this rail route using the latest ETCS technology from Bombardier will have the benefits of creating an interoperable corridor section that will both contribute to the development of the national network in Croatia and enhance transport links with the rest of Europe.

Within Croatia, the rail corridor from Vinkovci in the east of the country to Zagreb in the west covers approximately 300 km.

Croatian Railways and its infrastructure arm HZ Infrastruktura d.o.o. placed the contract in 2008 for the upgrade of the 33km section to Tovarnik with a consortium comprising Bombardier and SITE S.p.A with SITE responsible for the installation, power supply and telecommunications. The double track route incorporates 3 existing stations and 9 level crossings.

Increased line speeds The introduction of the new technology on the Vinkovci to Tovarnik section enables trains to operate at speeds of up to 160 km/h, from a previous maximum line speed of 120 km/h. The route upgrade forms part of an extensive programme of network modernisation being undertaken by Croatian Railways (HZ). In addition to suffering from lack of investment over a significant period during the 1990s, coinciding with the outbreak of war in the former state of Yugoslavia, damage caused as a result of the conflicts also took an expressly punitive toll on the rail network.

Pan European Corridor X was the tenth corridor added to a number of major routes comprising road, rail and waterways - which, whilst requiring investment, had been identified as being strategically important to the transport infrastructure in Central and Eastern Europe. The initial 9 routes had been identified in a sequence of Pan European Transport conferences held in Prague in 1991 and in Crete in 1994. A third conference, held in Helsinki, proposed a new Corridor X to link Salzburg in Austria with Thessaloniki in Greece passing through Austria, Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia, Macedonia and Greece and with one of four branches routing to Istanbul in Turkey.

A complex installation Being the first ERTMS Level 1 project in Croatia, the project presented complex challenges on various levels as Domenico Fraioli, Project Manager for Bombardier Transportation Rail Control Solutions explains: “This was the first electronic signalling system in Croatia and hence the new technology was unfamiliar to the client.

The complexity of the project was compounded by the fact that we needed to design a system that could interface between the old level crossings and the new electronic systems. For cost reasons, the customer was keen to retain and modernise the existing crossings rather than introduce completely new equipment”.

The project has ensured the introduction of the latest generation EBI Lock 950 computerbased interlocking (CBI) system and wayside equipment, and certification of the system for operation in Croatia. This milestone follows the successful delivery of EBI Gate level crossing systems for the same line.

Bombardier installed 3 new EBI Gate 2000 level crossings (one for each station), developing a special interface for the old open line level crossings (EBI Gate 1100) and the EBI Lock. This enabled the existing level crossings to be interoperable with the new generation of signalling.

Bombardier ERTMS es un lieder global en el sector de la alta.

Millions of safe journeys More than 240,000 Eurobalises Over 2,500 vehicles 15,000 km of track One standard, one leader

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Š 2012, Bombardier Inc. or its subsidiaries. All rights reserved.

There are no limits

18 | the rail engineer | march 2012

signalling/telecoms A Bombardier TRAXX F140 MS (multisystem) locomotive, owned by CB Rail, was leased to be used as the onboard unit for the wayside tests. Whilst configured for Germany - Austria Belgium - Netherlands routes, the locomotive has been used in several countries for testing purposes.

Tovarnik Station before refurbishment (Centre) TRAXX test locomotive.

Deletovci Station.

Interlocking systems EBI Lock 950 computer-based interlocking systems supervise and control wayside objects, including signals, point machines and level crossing protection equipment. The interlocking system receives route commands from traffic control centres, or local control systems and sends indications or status reports back. The interlocking system checks that conditions for the commands are fulfilled, locks routes and releases them after the train passes. EBI Lock 950 systems comprise an interlocking computer, an on-line back up computer and centrally located or distributed object controllers. Object controllers provide the interface to the wayside units and are located with the interlocking computers in racks or cabinets holding printed circuit boards, power supplies, connectors and cables.

ERTMS solutions Since the inception of ERTMS, Bombardier, working closely together with UNIFE, has been a leader in the development of the specifications governing the system design and operational characteristics of the ERTMS standards particularly in areas such as balise transmission technology. Its ERTMS product strategy is based on offering a solution with low life cycle costs to

customers. Solutions can be individually tailored to customers’ needs, encompassing integrated control rooms, computer-based interlocking systems, onboard equipment, point machines, signals and level crossings, as well as onboard and wayside automatic train protection (ATP) equipment.

The company’s advanced solutions are now operating or being delivered on more than 2,500 vehicles and 15,000 km of track in 16 countries, including the highest speed ERTMS-equipped lines in China. In addition, Bombardier has delivered its ERTMS Level 2 solution for the Amsterdam-Utrecht line in the Netherlands, one of the busiest mainlines in Europe, as well as Sweden’s first high speed ERTMS Level 2 line, the Botniabanan, and other lines in Korea, Taiwan and Spain.

As part of extensive framework agreements in Sweden and Norway, Bombardier is delivering further onboard and wayside technology for ERTMS roll-out, including the world’s first Regional ERTMS application - the INTERFLO 550 solution on the Västerdalsbanan. Bombardier has also been awarded contracts for the first ERTMS systems in Algeria, Poland, Brazil and Hungary.

As this latest project has demonstrated, the widespread adoption of ERTMS is paving the way for exciting new rail corridors, contributing to a revitalisation of the rail network across Central Europe to the Balkan states and beyond.

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20 | the rail engineer | march 2012

signalling/telecoms writer

Simon Gardiner Managing Director, Gioconda

Cost effective Desktop Signal Sighting to Driver Briefing and beyond. A Full Service signal sighting was last covered D esktop in the rail engineer in issue 77 (March 2011). Since then, specialist developer and supplier Gioconda has continued to develop its desktop signal sighting processes and the tools that support them.

Furthermore, a positive advance by the industry seems to be the acceptance of this technology within the signalling design process, to the point that projects are now generally planned on this approach from the outset. This has been a major turning point, and is enabling Gioconda to concentrate on providing an efficient service rather than having to convince project teams and Signalling Sighting Committee (SSC) members that the tools are valid and cost effective.

The advantages of the desktop approach are reasonably clear: • Site access requirements are reduced; • Safety implications are minimal; • The desktop/classroom SSC meeting is more efficient and productive; • The sighting of each signal is easily repeated and options tabled; • In many cases it is less expensive than the manual method.

Recent review

London Bridge competes with The Shard.

An update to the Signal Sighting Standard was recently out for review and it appears that the desktop approach is to be fully supported under the revision. However, it is not currently backed up by any specification for accuracy and content of models and this may lead to “cheap and cheerful” systems being presented for SSC assessment. The revision further proposes that control is passed to the SSCs who have the right to veto the use of a model and complete the assessment trackside, although it makes no provision for training SSC members in the use and advantages of desktop signal sighting systems.

In addition to desktop signal sighting, Gioconda’s other core service is the provision of Driver Briefing Packs (DBPs) as required by train operators prior to signal commissioning. For projects to truly benefit

financially they should ensure that any desktop signal sighting models produced can be re-used and developed for driver briefing.

Joined-up models The maximum financial and time benefits of this process are only realised if a model which is created for signal sighting can be cost-effectively turned into a DBP. For example, last year an HD (High Definition) video-based signal sighting model was created for West Ham resignalling which included 26 signals and some signage. The cost of this work was in the region of £24,000. Sometime later, a DBP was produced taking into account some minor alterations and extra signals. The additional cost to the project for the DBP was only £7,000 plus the duplication of the DVDs & map books and the turn-around was only three weeks. If the desktop signal sighting models had not already been produced then the driver briefing package alone could well have cost £30,000, with no benefit to signal sighting.

Over the past few years, the company has been commissioned by many projects to provide driver briefing packs which involved building large and expensive 3D Virtual Reality (VR) models and is currently bidding

to supply several large models for driver briefing-only projects. In these situations, if projects had adopted desktop modelling at the earlier Grip 4 stage for signal sighting, there could have been substantial time and financial benefits.

Hopefully, with the continued acceptance of the desktop signal sighting process, there will be more re-use of models and thus the time and cost benefits will naturally be included. This is definitely the case with Gioconda-based projects but project managers should be aware that choosing to use a desktop signal sighting system that is non transferrable or ‘locked in’ may not allow the re-use of this model and they will probably end up paying twice!

Other offshoots of HD/VR signal sighting include: • Enhanced 3D graphics for presentations/consultations; • Constructability & IDC proofing Grip 5-8; • Volumetric calculations for civils and earthworks; • Stage-works and 4D modelling; • Training Simulator modelling/model conversion.

Where required, the output of the above can be a small add-on to existing models created from core products.

march 2012 | the rail engineer | 21

signalling/telecoms Unnecessary duplication Over the past few years, some unnecessary work regarding the re-use of models has been authorised, either because the project team has changed or because project managers are not aware of the available opportunities for cost saving. For example: Last year, at least two separate projects have commissioned duplicate VR models for promotional purposes - not taking into consideration that they already had very accurate 3D models which had been used for signal sighting.

Project team changes nearly led to new models being commissioned for driver briefing even though signal sighting models had been produced.

Projects paid over the odds for DBPs by including these into Grip 5-8 design contracts to suppliers who had to commission new models when signal sighting models already existed from other suppliers.

Where possible, Gioconda is doing its best to keep a finger on the pulse and, through a framework contract with Network Rail, highlight where re-use is possible. Recent project successes include: • EGIP Electrification - signalling immunisation exercise completed with the G-RAST toolset culminating with 250 signals assessed by SSC in 4 days; • EGIP Infrastructure - Gioconda HD & VR signal sighting in progress for several areas. VR signal sighting models further enhanced for public consultations; • West Ham resignalling - HD signal sighting

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driver briefing delivered; • Wessex Train Lengthening - 100% signals sighted using G-RAST (3 signals checked on site with same results).

Screenshot from Gioconda’s G-Player software.

So desktop signal sighting is now very much part of a variety of major and minor projects. As work continues, more SSCs will be aware of the benefits, and train operators will have access to detailed and realistic driver training aids.

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22 | the rail engineer | march 2012

signalling/telecoms

Telecommunicating Andy Hudson, heading up Network Rail Telecoms.

rail companies with P roviding telecommunications services is both complex and controversial. Historically, telecoms engineers were the junior partners in a combined S&T Engineering department.

Investment in telecommunications systems rode on the back of signalling, electrification and station modernisation schemes, with the more enlightened telecoms engineers arranging for these piecemeal projects to be joined together into regional or national networks. Only in the 1970s, primarily with the advent of data systems, did telecommunications projects gain an independent ascendency as BR and many other European Railways created new telecoms opportunities which revolutionised train operation and the general rail business. The resultant equipment asset base was the envy of many other organisations which were constrained by the monopolistic powers of the public telecoms operators.

All this changed when these monopolies were deregulated, privatised or broken up, with the rail telecoms networks being seen as ready for commercial exploitation. Two schools of thought emerged, either that telecommunications was a commodity just like gas and electricity and all rail needs could be sourced from the likes of BT, or that telecoms was an integral part of railway operations and that problems would soon occur if the railway lost control of its networks.

Which was right?

Privatisation In the UK, and some other countries, an independent rail infrastructure owner and several new train companies were formed, all of whom initially relied on the erstwhile railway networks for their telecoms facilities.

Charging mechanisms were needed to provide such services on a commercial basis, but these were crude as metering had not been a requirement of the previous rail organisation.

Very soon, other telecoms companies sought to enter the fray and were able to offer more competitive rates for some of the telecoms requirements, causing a downwards spiral for the business aspirations of the rail telecommunications departments.

What was to be done? In the UK, a new company - British Rail Telecoms - was formed with a twofold objective: firstly, to reorganise itself to be much more commercial in supplying the rail businesses with telecommunications, and secondly, to be sold off to a telecommunications company that could exploit the assets by selling capacity and services to a wider customer base.

Despite delays, BRT was eventually sold in 1994 to Racal Electronics. The sale consisted primarily of the voice, transmission and data networks but not the operational telecoms systems associated with the direct operation of trains, e.g. SPTs, signalbox communications etc, which remained with Railtrack, the infrastructure owner. With hindsight, Racal did not properly understand what they had bought or the responsibilities that went with it.

Eventually, the business was split up and sold again in 2000, the trunk cable, transmission and voice networks going to Global Crossing (acquired by Level 3 in 2011) and the rest, including most of the staff, to Thomson CSF, a French company now renamed Thales. Racal made a substantial profit from this sell off (perhaps questioning their original motivation) and the rail industry was left wondering just how robust the provision of telecoms services would be.

Network Rail, having replaced Railtrack, made the decision to replace the sold off transmission systems with a new, nationwide fibre network (the FTN - Fixed Telecommunications Network) in readiness for the provision of GSM-R, the future trackto-train radio system that would replace the old BR radio networks. The investment has been considerable, around £1.5 billion, and these assets must be efficiently utilised to justify this expenditure.

Network Rail’s position Time never stands still and Network Rail itself is reorganising to become more responsive to the needs of its train company customer. Gone is the centralistic approach, with Territories being created responsible for all work within their area except for the most major projects. This is sensible for most activities but does not fit well for telecoms, where the need for reliable nationwide networking makes a centralised control element rather important. By 2009, Network Rail had regained most of the technicians under a TUPE transfer from Thales. The company is thus resourced to achieve self sufficiency in design, installation and maintenance. What is needed is leadership.

Enter Andy Hudson, the new Network Rail telecoms supremo brought in from Interoute, a European ‘cloud services’

Today writer

Clive Kessell platform company, to work out a vision and strategy for where the business should be going. He has had previous involvement with Hermes Europe Railtel (a pan-European telecoms business engineered around railway fibre networks) and Telfort (the BT joint venture with Dutch Railways that took over the railway telecoms network to form a new national telecommunications service provider and mobile operator), so the railway scene is not entirely new to him.

Network Rail Telecoms In a discussion with the rail engineer, Andy revealed that he has quickly grasped what is required and first fruits have resulted in the creation of a new company Network Rail Telecoms (NRT). It is clear that this is a very different company to BRT with its main focus being to emerge as a first class telecommunications provider to the rail industry.

As a priority, the FTN has to be completed and made robust. Designed to be resilient, it nonetheless has elements of its installation in the more rural areas below the standard one would normally expect. Andy is keen to ensure that the assets of Network Rail are fit for purpose and future proof, so some reinstallation might become necessary.

Designed as a series of resilient rings with traffic being rerouted if a ring is cut or develops a fault, this can lead to a situation where the staff treat the problem as nonurgent until a second fault occurs, which then causes a major crisis.

Therefore the reliability and availability of the total network must be guaranteed to be as close to 100% as possible. To achieve this means having carrier-class network management centres that operate around the clock to monitor all events and use remote diagnostics and reconfiguration should things begin to go wrong. When physical work has to be done onsite, then staff must be mobilised immediately under the control and guidance of the NOC (National Operations Centre). Waiting until the next morning because the mission critical traffic has been re-routed will not allow for industry service levels and availability to be met.

The ongoing menace of cable theft is a particular problem - even if fibre-optic cables are near worthless to the thieves; the damage can and does occur at any time.

NRT and British Transport Police have set up

march 2012 | the rail engineer | 23

signalling/telecoms a working group to combat and reduce such incidents, thus relying less on the network protection switching.

Providing the wider Network Rail organisation with telecoms facilities will be the testing ground. Much of it already happens, but the satisfaction of the ‘internal’ customer is crucial. Forming and aligning the telecoms teams into a structured NRT organisation has commenced, the aim being that everyone shares the same vision of accountability and success. The FTN has been designed to be a carrier network for GSM-R, which will also facilitate the distribution of data for the control of remote signalling interlockings and electrification SCADA systems. These are safety-related applications, and failure of the distributing network will result in train service disruption.

As such, the FTN has had to pass a safety case, an important step in gaining confidence for usage by other engineering groups within Network Rail.

A charging regime has to exist for even the internal customer and, at present, there is little option other than to do this on an asset-based register. The NRT vision extends, however, to re-engaging with the TOCs, FOCs and other business / engineering companies wholly associated with the railway. To prise these groups away from public telecommunications operator provision and back to NRT will require more sophisticated means of measuring usage and service level. This will require investment in ‘metering’ systems but these may become easier to provide since, with modern replacement equipment, metering comes as part of the Operating and Business Support Systems (OSS and BSS) .

Operational telecoms Andy Hudson shows pragmatism on the question of how to manage and maintain the myriad of lineside SPTs, level crossing phones and other telecoms equipment scattered around the railway. For NRT to take on this portfolio would require many more technicians, all of whom would need to be safety certified for trackside work. The majority of operational telecoms responsibility will therefore remain with the new Network Rail Territory Managers who will continue to use signal technicians for first line maintenance of trackside phones thus achieving economies of scale.

The vision, however, does not end there.

The emergence of GSM-R and the increasing sophistication and integration of telecommunications for the new Network Rail Signalling Centres should logically lead to NRT being the design authority and equipment provider for such systems. All of this will require close co-operation and trust between NRT and the Territory Managers and Andy is already forging the necessary links. Having demanding but realistic service level agreements (SLAs) in place will be key, and these are now being negotiated. Included within the SLAs will be Territory based maintenance services to support the FTN infrastructure, requiring maintenance staff to have the skills, tools and techniques commensurate with the technologies and customer / industry expectations.

The provision of customer information systems, indicators, public address, clocks and the data that drives them, has traditionally been a telecoms responsibility and NRT will assume this role for the Network Rail managed stations. NRT however does not have responsibility for Station Information Support Services (SISS) across the wider railway but would like to offer its services to the TOCs, perhaps also including other value-added telecoms products. The Regulator is intent on making the management of SISS a TOC responsibility upon franchise renewal and NRT’s positioning in this will require careful thought.

Future challenges The general-purpose railway telephone network, ETD (Extension Trunk Dialling), including the important 999 emergency and 17x electrification control access services, remains the contractual responsibility of Level 3 to provide. There is no immediate need to change this arrangement, but NRT will be exploring the long term needs of this service and considering whether anything more modern will be required for voice strategy and network capabilities to gain efficiency and reduce operational cost.

The FTN was designed to use SDH (Synchronous Digital Hierarchy) as the transmission medium. This remains a valid technology but is already declining in favour of IP (Internet Protocol) networking (see the rail engineer issue 59, September 2009). The Scottish Territory of Network Rail is perhaps paving the way by providing an IP network to support the Paisley LLPA (Long Line Public Address) system which is now being expanded to the whole of Scotland with a whole host of other usages (see the rail engineer issue 72, October 2010). NRT is well aware of this initiative and may well use it as the beginning of a nationwide strategy for an IP based DWDM (Dense Wave Division Multiplexing) MPLS (Multi Protocol Label Switching) network to give unified connectivity capability allowing a ‘plug and play’ delivery model.

The growing demand for improved communication for passenger usage on stations and trains, both broadband and voice, will indeed be something in which NRT would wish to be involved. In conjunction with the ORR and DfT, NRT is

currently looking at technology and partnerships to ensure that both asset utilisation and services are aligned with regulation. Providing WiFi and WiMAX access on stations is a logical expansion of service, and product development is underway in line with access technology and customer demand. The need to provide better communications to trackside staff is recognised. In parallel with the ORBIS (Offering Rail Better Information Service) initiative, the delivery programme for the Asset Information Service (AIS) is aimed at giving improved “on demand” asset data and stimulating an improved culture in the use and update of asset records.

Exploiting the network will always be a consideration as NRT matures and develops its capabilities as a customer-focussed service provider. Whilst bandwidth is now cheap, there are market sectors that can make good use of any NRT bandwidth / capacity in a commercial arrangement. Since FTN was effectively funded from the public purse and is routed to many of the remoter parts of the UK, the opportunity to provide broadband services to such places is being investigated as a joint initiative with the government-led Broadband UK scheme.

Above all, NRT is there to focus on the railway. No-one should remain with the illusion that telecommunications is a bolt on extra. It is fundamental to the operation of trains in all the guises embraced by that. NRT looks set fair to be the company of choice for all rail telecommunications requirements.

24 | the rail engineer | march 2012

signalling/telecoms

writer

Grahame Taylor

Levelling on crossings I can’t sleep at night! I think of level N o,crossings and level crossing safety all the time as we have so much to do, so much to change.”

Martin Gallagher is Network Rail’s head of level crossings. With a background in safety he deals with policy and strategy, assurance and national programmes for level crossings. And there are about 6,500 of them which might account for some of his temporary insomnia.

He has taken time to talk with the rail engineer to explain how Network Rail now manages what continues to be a very emotive subject.

Close the lot!

So, where does he start? With a list. Then all the level crossings are ranked in what is considered to be risk order. The risk factors include obvious things like the speed of trains which impacts on recognition and decision times, the number of people using the crossing and the number of lines to be crossed. There can be local environmental issues such as a nearby school or pub. All of these, and many other sensitivities, are used to develop a sensible risk profile for each crossing.

So, why not close the lot and make all the problems go away? Well, the railways can’t just shut a level crossing. The majority of the network’s crossings have public rather than private rights of way associated with them and to close them needs planning and local authority approval to extinguish or divert a right of way. It is not within Network Rail’s gift to actually close a public level crossing.

Common misconception

Shiplake, Berkshire (2006).

Level crossings have been closed ever since they were invented, so what is the rate of closure nowadays? Martin is on home ground now, “We’ve increased the rate many fold. Back in 2008, I think we were closing crossings at a rate of about 20 a year nationally. Now we’re closing 200 a year.”

These have been mostly private, userworked crossings because they’re easier to close than those with public rights of way.

The rights to the crossing are owned by private individuals or companies and it’s within their gift whether they release the rights to those crossings or not. There are 2,500 of this type of crossing and it is a common misconception that they all carry a low risk. The Sewage Works Lane accident on the Sudbury Branch in 2010 was a userworked crossing. They present a considerable amount of danger, and closing them obviously eliminates any risk and also reduces operational costs.

The release of rights is fairly easy to achieve. There are situations where landowners have four or five user-worked crossings and Network Rail can enter into negotiations to suggest that use can be consolidated to just one or two.

“In the past a lot of things were done from the office, desktop studies and the like, but now we’ve got groups of staff based throughout the country who are experts in negotiating

closures. We’ve closed over 500 since 2009 and we’re overlaying that with more public road crossings - but of course these are more contentious. Surprisingly, perhaps, it is not unusual for there to be a split in the community. Half love their crossing, the other half are quite happy for it to go.”

Obligations under Safety Law Whilst there are benefits, there are, of course, associated costs. The balance of cost versus benefit can be extraordinarily difficult. After a long pause, Martin sighs and adds, “We’ve taken a decision internally that, as far as our obligations under Health & Safety Law is concerned, saying things don’t stack up financially is not always defendable.

What we should be doing is making decisions based on expert judgement based on whether it’s the right thing to do balanced against the cost benefit.”

march 2012 | the rail engineer | 25

signalling/telecoms Martin cited the case of open level crossings in Scotland. These crossings don’t have barriers - just a wigwag and a flashing light.

Network Rail has begun a programme of enhancing these crossings by overlaying them with a half barrier. This is a short term solution which has no real business case, but it’s an area that has been heavily scrutinised because open level crossings make up something like 2% of the total crossing population but account for 30% of accidents.

The conclusion by many is that the crossings are unsafe and so they need barriers - a classic case of “something has to be done”. But analysis in conjunction with the British Transport Police reveals that most of the people who have been prosecuted for violations lived within 12 miles of the crossing.

Drivers performing their own cost benefit analysis perhaps?

Innovation Martin admits that some of the damage from criticism is self-inflicted. Level crossing technology has to catch up with current developments. And there is a need to change the ways in which the railways introduce innovation. Traditionally it’s been clunky, slow and overly bureaucratic.

“I can understand why we need safety validations, why we need rigorous resilience and testing programmes, but consider this example: a set of miniature warning lights costs £¼ million. We have a problem at a number of rural crossings that could be

The TAWS Mapping Display allows managers to view even greater train position detail when required.

(Bottom) The TAWS Train Module is a transponder capable of accurately reporting the train’s position.

mitigated by a set of miniature warning lights which themselves have a safety integrity level of 99.99995%. I think that’s the right number of nines....

“But there is no business case to spend £¼ million at every rural crossing, so nothing happens. Then someone comes up with a safety enhancement that’s a different type of technology but that has a safety integrity level of 99.95% - slightly fewer nines. It costs just £15,000 to install in a day, but the railway shuns it. The Rail Regulator has been really supportive and has the view that if something enhances safety, then it should be introduced. It may not be as good as the gold-plated version but if it’s better than what you had previously then go ahead.”

“In fact we have developed something that is GPS based to track train position. It was designed initially for trains on the

Sudbury line and it’s on trial at the moment. It gives train location information to the signaller in Liverpool Street IECC, so hopefully the problem of signallers and users not knowing the accurate position of the train in long signal sections should be a thing of the past. Shortly the crossing user too will be able to see this information on a screen at the crossing. It is a really good system, installed in a day, at a fraction of the cost of a set of miniature warning lights.”

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26 | the rail engineer | march 2012

signalling/telecoms

Overseas experience Stallingborough, Lincolnshire.

(Right) Test train approaching MCB CCTV crossing at Frinton-on-Sea in 2009.

Cosworth, near Newquay in 2004.

(Below) Cosham, Hampshire.

There is much to learn from overseas experience. Martin’s team has spent a lot of time in dialogue with contacts across the world looking at some of the things they do.

A good example is Israel, where they improved safety hugely by taking some very low-cost pragmatic steps. They’ve developed luminous paint that’s equally visible by day or night and they paint the approaches to their crossings with a distinctive blue colour.

They’ve put a lot of cameras in at their crossings as well as obstacle detection systems. Japan has been using obstacle detection systems for years, as has Germany and many other countries. Other low-cost measures are available, such as rumble strips and measures that slow vehicles down on the approaches. But in this country this needs local authority cooperation or draft approval.

Many European countries have taken policy decisions which state that they will not have crossings on anything wider than double track or with line speeds >120 km/h.

If you go to Norway you won’t find any level crossings on high speed lines. Portugal has gone through a similar process. In this country a lot of funding would be required for such a policy decision.

Changing people’s perceptions Public opinion is often informed by professional commentators. Martin asserts that, “The way that we need to change people’s perceptions around level crossing safety is by demonstrating to these commentators that things have changed, and things are changing, through delivery; through all the promises we’ve made, the investments, the improvements to asset condition and to risk management. If their opinions can be changed then this may affect the commentary that they give to the public on the way that Network Rail is dealing with level crossing safety.

“After a fatality at a crossing there are often remarks like ‘an accident waiting to happen...; they’ve had so many warnings....; hardly surprising...’

“Hopefully the slant may change to an acceptance that we’re never able to completely eliminate accidents, but there have been massive efforts to improve the way this risk is managed. So far as some of the local authorities and local politicians are concerned, there’s a huge amount of lobbying to be done on safety responsibilities around level crossings. The perception in general is that level crossing safety is a rail-only responsibility.”

Risk-qualified Martin has a team of 20 specialists based at Network Rail’s National Headquarters working on forty different projects to improve safety. Half of these projects are around safety enhancements, with some big capital investment schemes looking at introducing enforcement cameras at crossings, and also asset condition monitoring cameras. These would allow realtime monitoring of rural crossings, checking sighting, and detecting whether gates are left open. “Camera technology is great these days and these projects will change the way we manage crossings on the ground.”

At the moment, assessment and inspection processes are fragmented - they’re not carried out by the same person. A mobile operations manager goes out to collect data on usage then a risk coordinator enters that information into the national database and comes up with a score that shows which options are available to improve safety. An asset inspector from Offtrack goes out and inspects the crossing. A recurring theme in accident investigations has been a criticism of the quality of assessment, the quality of inspection, and the fragmentation of communication. Martin’s aim is to create dedicated level crossing managers who would be responsible for all those activities.

They’ll be professionally trained and would be riskqualified. “I don’t imagine the oil or nuclear industries allow anyone to risk assess a safety critical asset who isn’t professionally qualified.”

Firm commitment “Nobody would be able to claim that they are content with level crossings at the moment, but I am content with the plans we have in place and in our progress.

“The Board has set us some really good challenges and supported us. We have been given £100 million, which is a lot of money in these austere times. They’ve given a firm commitment that they want level crossing safety to improve. I couldn’t ask for more support than that.

“At the moment it’s still work in progress, but perhaps, reasonably soon, I will be able to sleep better at night.”

march 2012 | the rail engineer | 27

signalling/telecoms

Asking

about rubber level crossings, and level crossing W ithsafety, very much in the public eye, the rail engineer met with Richard Whatley, Managing Director of STRAIL (UK) Limited, to ask about the advantage of rubber crossing surfaces.

TRE: What made you interested in rubber level crossings in the first place?

RW: Speaking honestly, it was my father. He became involved over 25 years ago, and, if you think about it, rubber is an ideal material. It absorbs noise and vibration, it isolates the track from the hammering of heavy traffic, and so it protects track geometry and it makes for a quiet crossing.

TRE: We understand that STRAIL crossings are “green” and that recycled rubber is involved.

RW: That’s right. The German company which makes the crossings is part of a large group specialising in rubber. Retreading tyres is one of its many activities. The process involves stripping

off the worn treads and vulcanising fresh treads in their place. A great deal of rubber is left over and the company, already experts in the vulcanising field, decided to turn it into level crossings.

TRE: We believe that vulcanising is more expensive than gluing with modern elastomeric adhesives. Why do you do it?

RW: If you apply sufficient heat and pressure to a mass of rubber granules they will melt into each other to become a homogeneous mass. This is called vulcanising, and it is the way in which vehicle tyres are made. The finished level crossings have the same properties of strength, flexibility and endurance, properties second to none. Yes, the tooling is expensive, involving massive heated and pressurised steel moulds, but we believe that the quality of the finished product justifies the expense.

Virtually all level crossings are made up of individual panels. A loose panel is a potential hazard. Therefore STRAIL panels are shaped to inter-lock with each other and under the head of each rail. Furthermore, high tensile steel tie rods run through the panels from end to end making it virtually impossible for a panel to break loose.

Mineral grit is embedded in the surface of each panel during the vulcanising process to guard against skidding.

Another hazard is presented by the flangeway groove beside each rail, particularly to cyclists. Strail have developed a replaceable honeycomb element to fill this groove. It is sufficiently strong to support a cycle, but it deforms under a tram wheel.

TRE: No two level crossing sites are identical. Do you make a new design for every site?

RW: Yes. We visit and survey every site, recommending the crossing type, quantities etc. Furthermore we have complete records of all the one thousand or so crossings which we have supplied.

TRE: You mentioned crossing type. Do you have a large range?

RW: Yes. They range from pedeSTRAIL, designed for pedestrians, through standard STRAIL, innoSTRAIL for lesser used crossings, pontiSTRAIL for very heavy traffic and veloSTRAIL for cyclists. Variations within each range are considerable and our engineers will recommend the right model for each application.

TRE: Would you like to say a word about safety?

RW: There are three obvious safety hazards in the composition of the crossings themselves: loose panels, skidding and flangeway grooves.

TRE: How about experience elsewhere?

RW: STRAIL claim to have made the first rubber level crossing. India was the fiftieth country to start using them and STRAIL have supplied about 40,000 world wide.

w www.strail.de

28 | the rail engineer | march 2012

feature

PARIS METRO LINE 1

A New Beginning

writer

Clive Kessell (Right) Paris Metro Line 1 Control Room.

first line of the extensive Paris Metro T henetwork, now owned and operated by RATP, was opened on 19 July 1900. Running from Porte de Vincennes to Porte Maillot, the line was equipped with 3-car trains which had a driving cab at one end only. Semicircular loops at the terminal stations enabled the trains to be turned.

Subsequently, the line has been extended to La Defense in the west and Chateau de Vincennes in the east, making a total of 25 stations with platforms lengthened to take 6 cars. Passenger loadings were initially quite low but nowadays the line carries 750,000 passengers per day making it the most crowded line on the network.

The line was built on the cut and cover principle but at Bastille, where it had to cross the Port de Paris Arsenal water channel, tunnelling techniques could not be trusted so a low level bridge was built. This necessitated steep gradients and very sharp curves which have been a challenge ever since. Running on the north bank of the Seine, the line is always busy; weekdays with people going to work and on business, evenings for theatre and opera goers, weekends with museum, shopping and tourist traffic.

Line 14 and a Modernisation Template In 2000, RATP took the decision to modernise the complete Metro network.

Most lines had infrastructure and trains that were 30-40 years old. So began Project OURAGAN (Hurricane in English) and to understand what this was all about, the rail

engineer spoke with Gérald Churchill, the project manager for Line 1 and Ariane Ramboër, the RATP press officer. Gérald had previously been the manager for Line 14 (the Metéor), newly opened in 1998 as the first example of UTO. Definitions may be needed here: ATO = Automatic Train Operation, retaining a ‘driver’ in the front cab; STO = Semi automated Train Operation, which under new European standards is the revised definition for ATO; DTO = Driverless Train Operation, with no driver but retaining a member of staff on the train as in Docklands Light Railway; UTO = Unattended Train Operation, with no member of staff on board, similar to common practice on airport shuttles.

Line 14 had been built with UTO in mind so the infrastructure was commensurate with the requirements. The line initially carried 140,000 passengers per day but this has risen to

500,000. In 2002, a paper was presented to the RATP Board showing that UTO was workable and that it should be considered for application to an existing line. No-one had tried such a conversion before, but a feasibility study in 2003 showed that it was technically possible, would generate additional capacity and be economically viable.

Line 1 was an obvious choice because of the severe overcrowding. RATP engineers were entrusted with the production of a specification and the subsequent project management with Board approval being given in April 2004. A condition set by the Paris Highways Authority was that train traffic must not be interrupted by the implementation works. The project was split into 5 main elements: • Replacement of the Rolling Stock; • Replacing the old STO signalling with a new UTO and the provision of Platform Screen Doors;

march 2012 | the rail engineer | 29

feature

• Civil works to adapt the platforms for screen doors; • New telecom systems in line with UTO requirements; • Social negotiations to change the conditions of working.

All of these had their challenges, but the platform works and changed conditions of working were the hardest to achieve.

UTO Requirements Having no member of staff on a train carries a new set of risks, all of which have to be carefully considered and mitigated. There must be constant supervision of the passengers en route from boarding to disembarking with the ability to deal remotely with any incident that might arise.

The basics are: • UTO of trains with guaranteed stopping position at stations; • Train cars to be without bulkheads such that an end to end ‘hollow tube’ results; • Platform screen doors to ensure safe entry and exit from trains; • Automatic opening of doors at stations once the train is stopped with timed closure of doors depending on the known passenger numbers at any particular station; • CCTV coverage of every car, each camera being linked by radio to the control room and all pictures recorded for possible police evidence purposes; • A panic alarm in each car, which when operated automatically brings up the CCTV picture of the car; • Public address from control to train at any time during the journey; • Continued movement of the train to the next station if the alarm is activated unless the train is already stopped; • Easy means of getting staff to the train if a failure occurs.

All the technical elements of these had been tested on Line 14. However, it was one thing installing them on a brand new line, quite another thing applying them retrospectively to an existing one.

Line 1 employed around 250 drivers and, under UTO, they would not be needed.

Many drivers were well qualified, often being recruited at graduate level, and RATP was anxious not to use this skill base.

Negotiations with the trade unions commenced in 2007 and proceeded on a constructive basis on the presumption that

the interests of the company took priority.

Various options emerged, the three main ones being: • Redeploy drivers to another line; • Keep them on Line 1 until full implementation and then retire them aimed at the older staff; • Retrain them for a more senior job on Line 1 such as executives in the Operation Control Centre (OCC) or on stations.

Another short term option has been to create ‘rolling’ teams, positioned every 4-5 stations, to be available to recover or assist trains that encounter a problem, either technical or passenger related. It took time but the negotiations were eventually successful and a formula for the future has been established.

Design and Construction Fundamental to success was a new, yet proven UTO system. This was competitively tendered with 5 firms invited, all of whom had a system that was in use elsewhere. The contract was awarded to Siemens France the former Matra Transport company acquired by Siemens in the 1990s. As such, it is a French system. The new system is moving block but operated as a virtual block so that sections remain discrete even though they can be shortened if traffic and speed conditions dictate. The contract required that the new signalling infrastructure had to be superimposed over the old, such that both technologies could be controlled from the new Operations Control Centre. This is similar to methods employed on London’s Victoria line.

Equipping an old type MP89 train with the new control equipment enabled test running at night to prove that both old and new systems could operate safely together.

The new trains of type MP05 are being supplied by Alstom from their Valenciennes plant. There are two separate contracts, one to build the trains including all the power equipment and passenger facilities, the other to equip the trains with the VPPI (video protection and passenger information) system. Several sub-contracts were needed for the supply of component parts. The first train was delivered in mid 2008, ready for initial testing at the Valenciennes test track.

The second train was delivered to Paris in May 2009 for certification testing and the main production run started in October 2009. Whilst Alstom built the trains, the UTO package was supplied by Siemens, including the train borne equipment. As is often the case, this split responsibility caused a few problems along the way. Gérald reminded me of the English expression, ‘the devil is in the detail’, although with this project ‘the devil is in the interface’!

(Middle) Raising the Platform Level.

(Bottom) Installing the platform screen doors.

30 | the rail engineer | march 2012

Communications Radio is the fundamental transmission media, with three separate systems in use: • Free space propagation using tunnel mounted aerials in the 5.6GHz band for the UTO system; • WiFi for the video transmission from each car to the OCC; • Tetra for the voice systems for staff and passengers communication to the OCC. Each of the new trains has to be equipped with three aerial systems.

feature

each end of the platforms. The problems did not end there; with the doors fitted, the old MP89 trains then had to be fitted with antennae to activate the doors and, with the old STO system not having the same accuracy as the new one, would the trains stop in the right space envelope? RATP made visits to London to see how this was managed on the Jubilee Line with manual driving and were reassured that a margin of error could be accommodated. This has proved acceptable and an error rate of 1 in 10,000 has been achieved.

started, mainly involving the on-train systems, which took only about 2 weeks to resolve.

Door closure times at known busy stations are set at 50 seconds, elsewhere it is 40. Station dwell times can be remotely changed from the OCC. A critical test came on 9 Jan 2012 when an incident on RER line A caused a shutdown for a period, with many travellers transferring to Line 1. Every possible train was pressed into service and one million passengers were transported in the day. The current headway using a mixed fleet is 105 seconds but this will improve to 85 once the new trains are fully deployed. Signals will remain in place for manual driving in degraded mode operation. Currently a UTO train will not pass a red signal under the ‘overlay’ rules but once all the new trains are in service, the signals will be changed to a blue aspect The Line 1 upgrade and full automation has cost €600 million. Of this, €400 million has been for the new trains, €150 million for the UTO and telecom systems, and the remainder for the installation of screen doors. The system will be maintained by RATP staff, with initial training being undertaken by the supplying companies. A small separate OCC exists mainly for training purposes but it can also be used for limited functionality operation if disaster recovery is needed.

The Future Platform Screen Doors The UTO and telecom systems had all been tried out on Line 14 so applying new versions of the equipment to Line 1 was not too much of a problem. Installing platform screen doors to a working railway was a very different scenario, however, and this turned out to be the biggest challenge. The platforms were found to need reinforcing and increased height. To do this was not a quick process. A joint contract was let to Sogea TPI and Eiffage TP. The concreting was done at night but the station then had to be closed for the concrete to cure. This caused some disruption but, with stations close together, it was considered acceptable for passengers to use adjacent ones.

Once the foundation work was finished, the screen doors were installed at the rate of 3 per night, this work being contracted to the Swiss company, Gilgen Door Systems. It took between 10 and 14 days to install a complete station, Bastille being the worst because of the sharp curves and slants at

Work Completion and Implementation

By May 2011, all infrastructure work was completed. 13,000 work sites had been needed with up to 100 sites at any one time; in all that period, no major safety incident had occurred. The testing could now begin starting at night and then in the daytime from July, by progressively running new trains in automatic service mode but empty of passengers in between the old trains. This was part of the safety certification process involving Certifer, a French railway certification agency.

Main approval came in September 2011, with final signoff being achieved in November. Eight trains then went into passenger service interspersed with the old trains. This number is gradually being increased as trains are delivered and, at the time of writing, about 20 are in traffic. It will take until Jan 2013 before all new trains are in service. Some technical hitches were encountered once passenger usage

The displaced MP89 stock, still only 20+ years old, is being transferred to Line 4, replacing older trains in service. Once Line 1 is fully completed, the upgrade of other lines to UTO will be progressed but the procurement process will have to start again. Three new lines may also be constructed to form a Paris Ring - lines Red, Green and Orange - as well as extending Line 14 north and south. All of these will adopt the same UTO operating philosophy.

A 2025 completion date is tentatively put forward but this will depend on the availability of finance.

Can UTO be employed elsewhere? Yes, of course it can, and Nuremberg and Lausanne are two such cities where it is in operation. Could it happen in London? The Sub Surface Lines are similar in construction and operation to the Paris Metro but the deep level tubes would need careful thought. One senses that the human factors situation would be quite challenging!

Upgrade your stations to Business Class Platform Screen Doors (PSD) full- and half-height Your way to improve: • Passenger‘s safety and comfort • System efficiency and capacity • Station attractiveness

ms yste S r Doo ader in n e g Gil world le siness u The trofit b re PSD

Beside the benefits of the increased system efficiency and capacity, the options MétroLIGHT and MétroMEDIA allow the customer to refinance the investment.

All options are in operation and can be shown in Gilgen‘s spectacular exhibition booth MétroCUBE.

Gilgen Door Systems AG Marketing & Sales ADP Freiburgstrasse 34 CH-3150 Schwarzenburg Phone +41 31 734 41 11 Fax +41 31 734 43 24 adp@gilgends.com www.gilgendoorsystems.com

32 | the rail engineer | march 2012

feature writer

Paul Insley Senior Engineer, Balfour Beatty Rail

Thameslink’s

Canal Tunnels ten years ago, Channel A pproximately Tunnel Rail Link (CTRL), on behalf of the

Track work in place.

Now it just needs the switches.

Thameslink Programme, constructed two bored tunnels between the East Coast Main Line (ECML) at Belle Isle junction, just North of Kings Cross, and the St Pancras low level station. Each tunnel was constructed with a six metre diameter bore, about 500 metres long and pre-cast lined, and they form part of a new twin track railway approximately 900 metres long, the remainder being cut and cover boxes and open sections.

The two tunnels pass under the Regents Canal and have subsequently been called Canal Tunnels. At each end of the Canal Tunnels are double junctions. The junction at Belle Isle will be conventional ballasted trackform whilst at the St Pancras Low Level station end the junction is on a concrete track slab with resiliently mounted supports.

No services such as track work, lighting, power and emergency walkways were constructed as part of the original tunnel construction and, until 2006/2007, Network Rail had not obtained planning permission, legal powers and funding for the Key Output 2 works, of which this forms part.

Scheme Plan The Thameslink Canal Tunnels are part of a scheme to enable Thameslink services from Peterborough and King’s Lynn to travel south of the Thames and return. The Canal Tunnels project is a vital component of the overall Thameslink programme. It will deliver the infrastructure required to run up to 24 trains per hour per direction in the core area (between Blackfriars Junction to the south and Kentish Town to the north), permit longer 12 car trains to operate and allow more destinations to be served by Thameslink services.

As part of the advanced staging works, Balfour Beatty Rail was asked to install two NR60 D 13.5 slab track turnouts, designed to reduce vibration in nearby buildings at the northern end of the platforms. This scheme is known as Canal Tunnels Junction. The existing Up and Down Moorgate plain line tracks had previously been fitted with Vanguard baseplated slab track mounted on approximately 10-metre-long reinforced concrete slabs. Six of these slabs were to be removed on each line to allow the installation of the two new turnouts. All of

this had to be done without any speed or operational disruption to the existing Thameslink services.

Design and Planning Balfour Beatty Rail had to design and plan the job very carefully. Not only did they have to maintain Thameslink services, but the new track would have to meet stringent ground borne-vibration requirements due to the projects’ proximity to existing and new residential building developments. This requirement resulted in the design team, in partnership with Network Rail, selecting the Sonneville Low Vibration Track (LVT) system from Swiss manufacturer, Vigier. This system is a duo block slab track system with a rubber boot and block pad and has been used extensively in tunnels worldwide.

The main works were planned to take place in four key 53-hour possessions, backed up with a small number of limited mid week 3.5 hour working windows. At the end of each key possession, the track had to be handed back in complete working order and with no temporary speed restrictions. In addition, as the work was adjacent to the platforms at St Pancras, dust and noise were issues and as the site is underground, access and logistics were critical.

The original 10-metre long reinforced concrete slabs were at least half a metre deep and had been in service for a number of years, so careful structural design and system interaction was required. The first option considered was to reuse the existing slabs as part of the design, using directly mounted baseplates, but this was not deemed acceptable for this project.

Complete removal and re-cast was considered, but to remove them entirely would have required the use of concrete breakers. Previous experience of similar works at Thameslink Clerkenwell suggested that this would not be practical given the time constraints and that a significant amount of manual breaking out would also be anticipated with the associated exposure of staff to hand-arm vibration, noise and dust.

march 2012 | the rail engineer | 33

feature

Working in partnership with consultants Heierli Consulting Engineers, a plan was developed to slice the concrete slabs in half and lift off the top half to allow a new surface to be recast. A number of methods of removal were considered as part of the risk assessed design. Using disc-saws was not seen as practical while implementing breaking equipment was too time consuming and would have created unacceptable amounts of dust and debris.

Diamond wire cutting was identified as the best way to cut through the track slabs entirely. This was supported with associated securing works to hold the track in place after each cut. Selecting this design meant that the risks of exposure to dust, hand arm vibration and noise would be minimal and it would also allow work to carry on in midweek nights and weekends, with the track handed back for operations every day with no requirement for speed restrictions.

Intensive Programme Diamond wire cutting is a specialist activity requiring few personnel but a controlled environment. It offers speed and significant noise and dust reductions over other methods. A cooling / lubricating water supply is needed, and exclusion zones have to be enforced during the cutting operation.

It is also a system that could be implemented in mid-week night possessions, leaving free time in the key 53 hour possessions to focus on heavy engineering works.

During the key possessions, the pre-cut slabs were lifted clear, and replaced with a one-piece slab that covered the footprint of the whole turnout. The straight through track of the Switches and Crossings (S&C) was replaced by plain line fitted on adaptor baseplates so that railway operations could continue. The plain line trackwork and S&C track slab was designed and installed in a manner which left the infrastructure in a position that will facilitate a method of speedy

installation for the switches, crossing and points system without greatly impeding the Thameslink services in any way at a later date.

The design and construction methodology used allowed the advanced programme construction works to be undertaken safely in a short number of key weekend possessions whilst meeting the stringent environmental design constraints of working in tunnels on one of London’s busiest commuter railway lines.

Lifting out a track slab.

THE SLAB TRACK SOLUTION FOR THE REQUIREMENTS OF TOMORROW

LOW VIBRATION TRACK (LVT)

www.vigier-rail.ch

VigierRail_Inserat_LVT_e_190x130.indd 1

10.02.12 15:35

34 | the rail engineer | march 2012

feature

writer

Mungo Stacy

Showing

your gauge is why railways exist. It drove the C oal initial need for mass transport, fuelled

(Right) A mixture of Standard and High Cube Containers in the same train.

the steam engines and powered the industrial revolution. Even into the 21st century, coal haulage for electricity generation remained the largest railfreight stream, typically accounting for 30% of freight moved by rail in Great Britain.

Last year marked a significant change. The official National Rail Trends recorded that 2010/11 was the first year that coal lost its largest market share. Coal is not king. The crown has passed to Intermodal - more familiarly known as containers.

Is this another sign of the decline of heavy industry, of our transformation into a leisureloving nation dependent on imports? Or is it a temporary blip reflecting volatile energy prices? The growth in container traffic is a strong trend with year-on-year growth of 7% for the last 8 years, a total increase of 70% since 2002-03.

Accommodating this growth is one of the key aims of the Strategic Freight Network.

This core network of trunk freight routes was established following the Government’s 2007 White Paper, ‘Delivering a Sustainable Railway’.

Significant infrastructure improvements have already been delivered in the current Control Period 4 since 2009. Regular readers of the rail engineer will recall articles about works in Southampton tunnel over Christmas 2009 (issue 64, February 2010) and at Winchester in Easter 2010 (issue 68, June 2010). Further developments over the coming years will dramatically increase the route options for container traffic.

Anorak time Containers are pretty similar: they have to be, for the whole concept to work. One obvious difference is colour: the choice generally depends on the shipping company’s preference. In physical terms the main classification is between short 20’ and long 40’ boxes. Beyond that, it could take a dedicated container-spotter to note any differences (try themovingcrew.org for starters).

In fact, a range of standard sizes are defined, by ISO and other standards organisations. Containers up to 8’6” height

can be carried on normal wagons throughout much of the UK rail network.

However, there has been increasing use of high cube 9’6” containers.

These pose a challenge for the rail industry, as the higher top corners cause issues particularly at arched overbridges. It is possible to fit the high cubes through the existing infrastructure using specialist low floor wagons. However, these generally cost more to build and maintain and reduce the potential train payload by up to one third major penalties for railfreight operators in competition with road hauliers.

Getting high cube containers on standard wagons may require gauge enhancement works to the infrastructure, but can lead to impressive productivity increases. The route from Southampton to the Midlands illustrates this. Following opening of the route for high cube containers on 4 April 2011, rail’s market share jumped from 30% to 36%.

Thinking freight Ian Cleland is Freight Development Manager with Network Rail. He says, “Freight tends to be the hidden side of railways, but there’s a great deal going on at the moment.

Over the next couple of years we will see the creation of a diverse strategic network for intermodal traffic and a huge leap forward in diversionary capability. These are essential for dealing with contingencies and the growing demand for seven-day operation.”

Freight investment has been brought under the umbrella of the Strategic Freight Network, which is governed by an industrywide steering group. This includes representation of freight operating companies, industry interest groups, the Department for Transport, Network Rail and others.

Cleland says, “A sustained long term strategy is essential to achieve rail freight growth. Short bursts of activity will not encourage hauliers to switch mode.”

This vision is provided by the Strategic Freight Network. Based on demand forecasts for 2030, it has nine core objectives for the development of the freight network.

Gauge enhancement is one; others include increased capacity, 24/7 capability and more efficient operations.

Longer and heavier trains are considered, together with improved terminals and interchange and protected freight paths.

Other aspirations include electrification of freight routes and extension of European UIC GB+ gauge capability beyond HS1.

The unified approach has been successful in garnering funding for the sector. The Government’s Control Period 4 settlement included £251 million for Strategic Freight Network improvements from 2009 to 2014.

In addition, £152 million was sourced from the Transport Innovation Fund and enabled a further £72 million to be leveraged from other sources.

march 2012 | the rail engineer | 35

feature Working network “The first priority has been gauge enhancement. That was the most immediate need”, says Cleland. “By 2014 we will have gone a long way to delivering high cube capability on the busiest routes where there is long term demand. After that, capacity will be the biggest issue into the next control periods”.

The programme has already come a long way. At the start of Control Period 4 in March 2009, just a few routes were cleared for high cubes. The larger containers could only travel unrestricted on routes from the UK’s busiest port at Felixstowe to London and Peterborough and on the West Coast route from London and the Thames ports to the Midlands, the North West and Mossend yard at Glasgow.

In addition to the Southampton route, April 2011 also saw completion of gauge clearance work from Felixstowe through Peterborough to the West Coast route at Nuneaton. This corridor provides a second route from Felixstowe, offering diversionary capability and avoiding London.

Other schemes are currently in hand. Site works including 16 bridge reconstructions are due to start in September 2012 on a £34 million diversionary scheme for Southampton via Salisbury to Basingstoke.

On the East Coast, it is ultimately intended to route high cubes from Doncaster via Lincoln, Peterborough and the Hertford Loop to London. A £9 million contract was awarded in January 2012 to Balfour Beatty for 18 overbridge reconstructions on the Doncaster to Peterborough section of the

GN/GE line. There are strong hopes that clearance of the East Coast route northwards from Doncaster to the Scottish Central belt will be completed by 2014, although planning is still in progress.

Cross-country links are being progressed, in particular Doncaster to Tamworth / Water Orton to give a Midlands to Yorkshire route.

On 29 November 2011 the Department for Transport announced funding for further gauge clearance between Leicester and Stoke, taking traffic from the North West away from the busy West Coast route through the Midlands.

Southampton Tunnel.

Grangemouth

Coatbridge Mossend

Hillington (Deanside) Elderslie

Selected Locations with Station NOTTINGHAM

(main city)

Preston

(other)

Sea Port & Intermodal Rail Freight Terminal

Port of Tyne

Felixstowe Intermodal Rail Freight Terminal

Barking Rail Network Network Rail Network Rail - W10 Loading Gauge

Teesport

W10 Loading Gauge at CP4 Start (April 2009) W10 Loading Gauge at April 2011 (additional from April 2009) Proposed W10 Loading Gauge at CP4 End (April 2014) Proposed W10 Gauge Route under development - outcome including date to be determined

Leeds

Proposed HPUK Section 106 W10 Works outcome including dates to be determined

Selby

Wakefield Trafford Park Port of Liverpool

Doncaster

Garston

Ditton

Birch Coppice Hams Hall Lawley Street

Ely

Daventry

Felixstowe

Barking

London Gateway

Tilbury

Port of Southampton

march 2012 | the rail engineer | 37

feature Out of the way There are many obstacles to clearing routes. Laser Rail, now part of the Balfour Beatty group, carried out a study in September 2007 for the Rail Safety and Standards Board. It considered 33,556 structures on 19 core and 11 diversionary routes. The finding was that 1,530 structures had substandard clearances for high cubes.

Reconstruction tends to be the last resort due to the expense and disruption, typically needing a 30 to 50 hour possession to redeck a bridge.

Track slews and track lowers may be a preferred alternative to achieve satisfactory clearances. They can also generally be fitted into 16 hour blocks, thus restricting the disruption to Sunday mornings.

However, there is a trade-off with achievable clearance. Reconstructions will generally be done to provide W12 gauge, allowing for 2.6m wide ‘shortsea’ containers. Track lowers may only be able to achieve W10 gauge for narrower 2.5m wide ‘deep-sea’ boxes.

The decision on each route depends on cost difference between providing W10 versus W12. For example, the route through Southampton Tunnel has been cleared to W10 gauge, whereas the East Coast routes are expected to achieve W12 gauge.

Many of the upgrades are on key passenger routes. An example is the Doncaster to Tamworth section which is critical for Cross Country Trains and is sensitive to route closures. On this route, only 3 reconstructions are needed but there are 42 track lowers and slews. In addition, the trackworks will result in other works including 6 platform modifications, some signal relocations and some works to platform awnings. Most of the work on this route has been backloaded to 2013 and 2014 to assist planning, and at present around 80% to 90% of the possessions have been agreed.

Network Rail tends to use framework type agreements to cover each area.

Contracting works on line-of-route rather than piecemeal has been found to create better performance and avoid conflicts between contractors.

A good example is the close working relationship which developed with Carillion leading to their innovative proposals for completing the Southampton Tunnel track lower in one Christmas blockade rather than two. This generated a huge financial saving which was a key contributor to completing the route to the Midlands £11 million below its £71 million budget.

Future schemes The next need will be for capacity improvements. The Strategic Freight Network proposes an investment fund of £350 million for Control Period 5 from 2014 to 2019. These form part of the Initial Industry Plan of September 2011.

The freight sector is currently lobbying hard on the value of the proposals.

Four principal schemes are proposed, of which three will provide capacity improvements. A second phase is proposed for Felixstowe to Nuneaton, including track doublings, remodelling of junctions, resignalling, headway improvements and line speed improvements.

Likewise, a second phase for Southampton to the Midlands will improve capacity. The proposal includes new freight loops, enhancements to existing loops to suit 775m-long trains, signalling headway improvements and bi-directional signalling.

The West Coast main line north of Preston is largely two-track and has been identified as a significant constraint on future traffic growth.

Here, the emphasis is about more efficient working by providing loops in the right place to suit modern traction characteristics and timetabling. The aim is to give an overall decrease in journey times by keeping loop stops brief.

The major gauge clearance scheme is the Great Western Main Line between London, Bristol and Cardiff. It was decided that this should be considered as an incremental scheme after the completion of electrification by 2016.

Bridge reconstructions required by the electrification will be constructed to suit W12 gauge for the largest containers.

investment in rail freight. It is also symbolic of a change in perception. No longer will the railway be seen merely as a carrier of bulk materials like coal.

Railways will be an integral part of a modern transport system able to satisfy the needs, locations, reliability and timescales of customers with highvalue goods. And the means of transport? The ubiquitous container.

New bridge at Stoke Charity, Winchester.

(Bottom) An example of bridge notching.

STRUCTURAL PRECAST FOR RAILWAYS

Freight line The industry plan emphasises the importance of rail freight to the national economy. Modal shift from road is a key opportunity: rail currently has only around 11.6% of the market for freight moved in the UK. The plan aims to stimulate economic growth by accommodating a 30% increase in rail freight moved by 2030, taking 15,000 lorry journeys a day off the roads.

Lindsay Durham, chair of the Rail Freight Operators Association, says, “The importance of rail freight in helping UK manufacturing grow is essential. The freight operators and Network Rail will deliver efficiencies to offer UK industry a competitive service, while focused investment in the network will deliver further significant modal shift to rail over the coming years.”

The growth of the network gaugecleared for high cube containers is a very visible indication of the

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38 | the rail engineer | march 2012

feature

A train heads towards Harlech past a block section marker (yellow arrow on blue background).

writer

Clive Kessell do interfaces mean to engineers?

W hat Perhaps a good definition would be the interconnection between systems or sub systems from the same or different manufacturers. But this falls way short of listing all interfaces that occur on the railway, many so obvious that we do not recognise them as such. This was the subject of the recent Railway Engineers Forum seminar held on 2 February in London. Interfaces are a known problem area but could they be managed better if an interdisciplinary approach were to be adopted? The seminar sought to gain the benefit of both good and not-so-good experiences of interfaces and to learn how business and other risks can be identified and managed. Also to probe how ingenious solutions might resolve the more challenging interfaces and examine whether a better understanding at the outset could resolve any problems.

The Wider Interface Realism An inspired key note speech by Prof Roderick Smith of Imperial College, President of the IMechE and well known for his witty presentations, got to the core of the subject. Interfaces can be physical, human or system, and are typified by movement, separation, load, friction, energy loss, cost and lubrication. The prime interface of steel wheel on steel rail comes down to diameter, cone and curve. Beyond that comes the interfaces for train movement: • Driver and signals • Train on track - quality of ride • Train and exterior - fuel, drag, emissions • Signals and catenaries • On board mechatronics - cab displays, in cab signalling (also in the past steam engine design).

The rail engineering mind will know all this but what about the social interface between systems and people? Many discrepancies emerge in values, interests, knowledge and power. Consider the experience of buying a ticket. Whilst e-ticketing is encouraged, the casual user often has difficulty with the web site. On encountering a ticket machine, it is invariably at the wrong height, the credit/debit card number requirement is difficult to understand and the fares matrix is bewildering. Apparent high price is off-putting to the casual user which leads to bad press.

Entering a platform requires ticket insertion, usually when one’s hands are full.

In Japan, barriers are normally open and read a contactless data card in the pocket. If this is not correct, the barrier will close.

PHOTO: FOUR BY THREE

Ingenuity at the Interface

In the station environ, there are too many negative signs - don’t do this, don’t do that.

The station may be filled with diesel fumes and noise - is train travel really so green? The condition of the track “four foot” in terminal stations is often disgusting - litter and other unimaginables! Staff if asked a question, may not know the answer - why do revenue protection people not know train times? A broader knowledge would be so much better.

The advent of high speed rail is welcomed but should be geared to regenerating and bringing together country economic conditions. The supply of electric power will be crucial but how fast should a train go?

Surely more important to work out what the journey time should be. HS rail is about mass transit for everyone, not just the rich!

Resolving the interface dilemma should be at the forefront of everyone’s mind.

Wherever possible, remove the interface entirely. Not always possible, of course, so remove unnecessary movement, think across the interface, lubricate the interface and understand the system objectives. This set the scene for what was to come.

ERTMS and the Cambrian Trial the rail engineer has reported on the Cambrian ERTMS trial on three occasions issues 74 (Dec 2010), 79 (May 2011) and 87 (Jan 2012). Various problems have emerged with the deployed system. Graham Scott from Interfleet Technology and Peter Leppard, the Operations & Safety Director for Arriva Trains Wales, critically analysed the interface weaknesses that have occurred on this project. From a TOC perspective, the retro fitting of the Class 158 DMUs proved to be a nightmare. Onboard equipment consisting of DMI, doppler and speed sensors, balise reader and antenna, onboard ATP (sometimes known as the EVC with a

march 2012 | the rail engineer | 39

feature SIL4 platform and difficult to change because of safety case approval) tachometer & odometer, GSM-R radio & antenna, juridicial recorder unit plus the inter-vehicle jumpers and a mass of cabling had to be installed on the train. All were difficult to accommodate on the unit and many proved troublesome when fitted. The train was just not suitable for conversion and it would have been easier (and probably cheaper) to have provided new DMUs with the ERTMS equipment factory fitted.

Operationally, the system is far too restrictive, forcing the Cambrian into a mould of conventional signalling unsuitable for the line. Too much caution is programmed into the braking curve characteristic and it always assumes the worst case. The effect is cumulative and has actually reduced the number of train paths when the aim was for them to be increased.

The speed profiles led to too many short speed restrictions which made the ATP application undriveable. Cab boot up times are far too long at around 1½ minutes, and the logic processes for the splitting of trains were not properly thought through.

Software upgrades take on average eight months to implement. The transmission of axle counter information over the FTN did not have the data formats configured properly.

It is to be hoped that operational as well as technical lessons will be learned, perhaps with a starting point that Railway Group Standards, the ultimate in interface documentation, are not optimal for ERTMS. The message is - don’t tinker with the existing, start anew. The S&T / T&RS interface needs careful thought; should the on-train equipment be procured by the train builders rather than the signal engineer? After all, it is supposed to be interoperable!

Platform Extensions Many platform extensions are currently being progressed to accommodate longer trains with the upsurge in traffic. Sounds straightforward, but many interface complications arise. Damien Gent is the Programme Manager for the Thameslink 12car project and gave a fascinating account of

the work carried out between London and Bedford. Involving 80% of the stations, the necessary civil works of digging out embankments, driving piles, etc. were obvious tasks. However, every extension encountered either a signal, overhead line structure, CCTV DOO camera, train stop sign or other encumbrance. Initially attempts were made to build round these but it was quickly realised that the best way was to move / relocate all such items out of the way first, expensive as this was. Building the platform proved to be relatively cheap.

Different standards now exist for platform width which could result in the tactile tiles and yellow lines having a dog leg in them where new met old. This looked odd so wherever possible the new platform would be built to the standards of the old. At Elstree, the use of modular platforms was tried with precast units coming from Germany on a low loader. This proved effective with 140 metres constructed in 24 hours by just 6 people.

Some locations were very difficult. At Luton, the 80 metre northwards extension was constrained by a road bridge that needed three bridge decks to be replaced on a different alignment. This was micro managed over four days at Easter 2010 with all work timed in 15 minute blocks. It took 13,000 man hours round the clock to complete and included realigning OLE structures and new signals.

At West Hampstead, with its close interchange to both the North London and Jubilee lines, it was recognised that the higher number of people using the station could not enter or exit the platforms quickly enough. Thus a new footbridge and a second station building were needed to disgorge passengers safely, resulting in a cost of £19 million against an initial budget of £3 million but with much praise being received for the end result.

Fitting Trains to Infrastructure Obtaining new rolling stock should not normally be a problem with interfaces but when coaches are three metres longer than the previous ones, all sorts of complication can occur. The Siemens Class 380 trains for

Every extension encountered either a signal, CCTV camera or other encumbrance.

PHOTO: JONATHAN WEBB

40 | the rail engineer | march 2012

feature

•

•

•

Class 380 at Siemens’ Krefeld works.

the Ayrshire coast were a case in point.

George Davidson, the Rolling Stock manager for Transport Scotland and Nick Hortin, the New Trains Director for First Scotrail, described some of the factors that had to be considered. Before such a project starts, there should be a Train Infrastructure Interface Specification (TIIS), but this was non existent so Siemens with ScotRail designed a compatibility plan.

Demonstrating that gauging and stepping were compatible with the existing network meant that the 23 metre long cars had to be 8cm narrower than the earlier 20 metre carriages. With an improved safety cell and crashworthiness for the driver’s cab, a sloping gangway connection was needed to give an acceptable right hand view. An enhanced automatic selective door opening using GPS and odometry was introduced so as to be independent of ground systems.

Despite testing on the Siemens test track in Germany, in Scotland the AWS receivers were found to be too sensitive and the totally software driven controls (except for the emergency brake) caused problems with driving techniques. As such, the trains were much delayed into service, with consequent delay to the cascade of the Class 334s to the Airdrie - Bathgate line.

Lessons have been learned and for the Edinburgh to Glasgow via Falkirk electrification, a TIIS is being prepared. A Network Rail system integrator will be appointed who will lead the compatibility exercise. Existing infrastructure constraints, principally at Glasgow Queen St where site restrictions mean the trains cannot be longer, has meant the trains will be 23 metre three-car units. They are expected to be lightweight, energy efficient and capable of 100mph, described as conservatively innovative.

Electrification Implications

Aerial shot of the works undertaken at Baker Street platforms 1, 2, 3 & 4.

Peter Dearman, the Network Rail Head of Network Electrification, who had given the annual railway lecture to the IET (issue 86, Dec 2011), described the massive programme of electrification being embarked upon; GWML, NW England, EGIP, Trans-Pennine, and five more schemes up for authorisation. Wonderful news, but what are the main interfaces that have to be considered?

• Bridges. Being built too small by the Victorians makes mechanical and electrical clearances a constant problem. Sometimes they can be adapted (soffits attached to

•

•

the bridge arch) but often a new bridge is required; Tunnels. These have similar space constraints but often with the added problem of water ingress. Latest thinking is for a solid aluminium conductor to keep the catenary away from the water flow; Grid Supply. A bulk supply is required but feeder points need to be at places where power lines cross the railway. Grid suppliers do not want to distribute large single phase loads. Supplies must also be secure, have the right capacity and be reliable; Telecoms. SCADA systems have to give protection and control of short circuits and have to distinguish between these and high loads. Whilst the problem of harmonic induction into copper circuits has diminished with the advent of fibre, immunisation must still be considered.

Earthing, bonding and the return path for traction current have to be managed and controlled; Stations and Signalling. Earthing and bonding remain important factors that must be understood and managed; Trains. Electrical loading and traction system noise are the biggest considerations but pantograph performance is another minefield. The experience of running Eurostar trains on the ECML will be remembered; the ‘Sherman Tank’ design of pantograph with a high upward thrust caused significant problems to the OLE. It is likely the new IEP will have two raised pantographs based upon latest TGV experience on the continent.

Other more obscure interfaces are: • Gas, water and oil pipelines - great care is needed when excavating for sub stations; • Power line crossings - enhanced clearances for 11 and 33kV local distribution networks; • Airports - when runways are adjacent to railways, trip wires are needed to switch off the current; • Other railways - LUL, Metros when compatibility with third-rail DC and tram power lines is needed; • Other grid customers interference from traction system effects, also imported harmonics; • Public and neighbours - visual impact, earthing / bonding, access to sites and homes.

All these have to be considered, negotiated, planned, implemented and mitigated for any electrification scheme.

London Underground Upgrade Programme The upgrade of the London Underground Sub Surface Lines (SSL) was reported in issue 85 of the rail engineer (November 2011). This described many of the interface challenges that existed with old and new signalling and interworking with other lines.

Kuldeep Gharatya, the Head of Systems for the Capital Programmes, explained some of the other interfaces that were emerging on both the SSL and the other lines that are currently being upgraded. His definition “The Whole is Greater than the Sum of its Parts” may be something that all of us should remember. LU is experiencing unprecedented overlapping upgrade programmes and is operating at the edge of the performance envelope.

Separate, and sometimes incompatible, elements within both the internal engineering group and the supply base must work (or be made to work) together.

Working in silos does not create reliable and effective end systems. Misunderstanding the interfaces cannot be afforded. The modern metro is a series of tightly coupled systems wheel-rail, signalling, train power, power supply, cooling, ventilation, emc, track to train coms, platform-train, ticketing, internet and more. All are software based systems and the complexity has to drive the interface. Even McNulty has said it is essential that interfaces are understood.

The new S Stock trains are the most complex yet. The functional requirements emerged in 3 phases - a brainstorming of need, an indicative design solution, and production of an ITT. Attempts by the signalling engineers to change what was already being supplied were not helpful.

Lessons from the SSL project will be incorporated into a new radical design for the deep tube lines where a whole system programme is being devised for the Waterloo & City, Piccadilly and Bakerloo lines. This will have high levels of automation to give 32 trains per hour capacity. Failing to achieve this will cost huge sums of money.

In Summary Altogether a fascinating day and those in attendance should be better informed on the interfaces that can and do occur. There are many more to consider but ignore them at your peril. Engaging all the engineering and operating disciplines at the outset must be the message.

march 2012 | the rail engineer | 41

earthworks

T’was in the year of ‘89 on that old Great Western line, When the winter wind was blowin’ shrill, The rails were froze, the wheels were cold, then the air brakes wouldn’t hold, And Number 9 came roaring down the hill - oh!

Robert E. Massey (1925)

writer

Nigel

Wordsworth

Preventing runaways children’s song The Runaway T heTrainclassic was written in 1925 by Robert E. Massey, Carson Robison and Harry Warren.

You may not know this first verse, but no doubt you can sing the chorus of “The runaway train came down the track and she blew…..”.

It is a humorous little song. But when the runaway train is a 28 tonne excavator, running down a gradient in the middle of a worksite, with the driver’s foot hard on the brake pedal, and it is still doing ten miles an hour, then it is not so amusing.

And to some extent, that is what has happened on occasion. Road-rail plant is usually a conversion of a machine normally used on roads and rough ground, and if that conversion isn’t perfect then trouble can occur.

Type 9b Following a detailed risk assessment, which included a number of calculations based on observations and incident reports, Network Rail derived that the biggest risk seemed to be with Type 9b excavators. For readers not conversant with the terminology, there are three types of roadrail excavators, depending on the type of rail wheels fitted. The reason for these

seemingly strange notations is to allow harmonisation with Europe; RRVs used within a possession are known collectively as Type 9 vehicles.

Type 9a vehicles have hydraulically operated rail wheels which, when lowered, lift the whole machine clear of the track. The flanged rail wheels are hydrostatically powered and the whole traction and braking system is independent of the original road-vehicle.

Type 9b also lift the road wheels clear of the track so that the machine only runs on its flanged steel wheels. However, drive and braking still comes through the rubber tyres, which either rub against the steel tyre of the flanged wheel, or on a knurled stub axle which protrudes from it.

Type 9c have flanged guide rails which are let down at each end of the machine to keep it on the track. However, the rubber road wheels sit on the top of the rails and provide traction and braking directly between the tyre and the rail surface.

The problem seemed to be with those type 9bs which were arranged so that the rubber road tyres drive, and brake, the machine by friction against the steel rail wheel tyre. In dry conditions, and on level track, there is no problem at all. The driver

puts his foot on the brake, the rubber wheels slow down and stop, and so do the rail wheels.

However, and it’s a big however, occasionally that doesn’t happen. If the interface between the rubber and steel wheels becomes contaminated by oil, or leaf mould, and that then becomes wet, and the rubber tyre isn’t perfectly inflated, the steel wheel can slip on the rubber one. And then you’re in trouble. Once that slip has begun, there is nothing to stop the machine until it runs out of energy or until the interface between the two wheels dries out and friction returns. But on a steady downgrade, that could be in a mile, or more.

A neat front brake arrangement by GOS Engineering.

42 | the rail engineer | march 2012

earthworks

Improved braking (Left) 28 tonnes of excavator hits the wet track!

(Right) Note how the disc guard prevents damage to the brake disc on this Allan J Hargreaves installation.

So, to protect track workers and others, not least the excavator driver, something had to be done. Network Rail decided that all class 9b excavators would have to be fitted with a braking system that acts directly on the rail wheels. This would not only have to apply to new machines, but be retro-fitted to the entire fleet that is used on the railway. And because this is a new requirement, Network Rail would have to pay for it.

Several suppliers were asked to develop a suitable braking system and tender to retrofit the fleet. At the same time an analysis of the exact number of machines used on the railway was undertaken, and a decision was made to fit brakes to about 75% of the hire fleet as these are the core machines that are used by Network Rail on a regular basis. A total of 450 machines were identified as needing upgrading.

Three suppliers were selected - Rexquote, Allan J Hargreaves, and GOS Tool and Engineering Services. All three fitted their system to an excavator, and sent it off to Network Rail for evaluation. After some “tweaking”, all three came up with approved solutions, and the rail engineer went off to a snowy Tuxford in North Nottinghamshire to have a look.

Test track The Rail Innovation and Development Centre (RIDC) at Tuxford is on Network Rail’s High Marnham test track and is about three miles from High Marnham Power Station and ten miles from the Robin Hood Line at Ollerton. A series of sidings and spurs off the single-track line at the RIDC allow vehicles to be tested on gradients, canted track and tight curves without obstructing the main test track.

The first demonstration was of a Readypower Gigarailer which had been fitted with a Rexquote braking system.

Although there was snow on the ground, the rails and wheels were dry. The heavy excavator came down a 1 in 25 gradient at 10 miles per hour and stopped just using the original road brakes. It seemed to stop fairly smartly and the flanged wheels locked.

After a few runs at different speeds, the rail wheel brakes were turned on and the tests repeated. Yes, the machine stopped a little quicker, but it didn’t seem too significant.

Spectators were left wondering, to an extent, what all the fuss had been about.

The braking arrangement was neat enough, and Rexquote personnel happily answered our questions, but at that stage no-one had really grasped the magnitude of the difference in braking efficiency the new system had. The rail wheels were fitted with extensions to give more tyre surface area for the road wheels to bear on - which may have contributed to the good performance in road-brake-only trim.

The skill of the driver, one of Readypower’s best operators, will also have helped.

The second test was on the flat, and involved a Balfour Beatty medium-weight (22 tonne) excavator fitted with Philmor road-rail gear and brakes by GOS Engineering. This one had a special trailer on the back to give a direct readout of stopping distance, including driver reaction time. As this machine couldn’t switch off its rail brakes (none of them will be able to in service, the two that could were for demonstration purposes only), we couldn’t see a comparative test, but it certainly seemed to stop quite quickly from a variety of speeds. The brake arrangement was again neat and workman-like. Large disc brakes were fitted inboard of each of the four rail wheels with heavy-duty hydraulic callipers of the type fitted to heavy earthmovers. A protective guard was fitted under each disc so, if the machine should become derailed, the disc itself wouldn’t impact the rail head and be damaged.

OMG! However, all debate about the need for the new system was silenced by the third test using a big Colmar T10000, owned by Stobart Rail and fitted with brakes by Allan J Hargreaves. This was the “adverse conditions” test and the rails were constantly wetted by a water spray. To make things worse, washing up liquid was dribbled onto the tops of the rails over a 40-foot length, to simulate the greasy conditions that can be encountered.

The excavator was run back and forth a couple of times to transfer the water and detergent onto the rubber wheels, getting the interface between rubber and steel wheels well and truly covered. Then, with the rail brakes turned off, the excavator came down towards the spectators at 16kph. When it drew level, the driver applied the brakes and - nothing happened!

That’s not quite true. The rubber road wheels stopped going round. But the steel rail wheels didn’t and the complete 28 tonne machine carried on at unabated speed. It eventually stopped some 80 feet further up the track - and that was on a slight upgrade. If it had been braking to avoid hitting someone who had stepped in front, they wouldn’t have stood a chance.

After a few more runs, with the performance being equally poor each time, the new brakes were turned on. Once again the heavy excavator reached a steady speed of about 16kph, the driver applied the brakes, and – it stopped! Without drama, and with the steel wheels just starting to lock, it came to a standstill quite quickly – and about 60 feet earlier than it had before.

The difference was startling.

That one test had made believers of all the spectators. Suddenly, the danger of unbraked steel rail wheels was obvious to all, and the improvement using hydraulic disc brakes was very marked.

Everyone gathered round the stationary machine to inspect the new brakes. Network Rail engineers were at pains to point out that all three approved braking systems had a similar performance – the difference on the day was simply due to the different tests being carried out.

They also advised that, if the “adverse conditions” had been applied to the first demonstration on the 1 in 25 gradient, the machine would not have stopped at all and they would have had to go and dig it out of the sand trap at the bottom. From the way they spoke, it had happened.

The big Colmar was then purposely derailed, and everyone could see how the disc protectors worked. But minds were not on that display, but the powerful memory of a 28 tonne excavator sailing majestically down a flat track, road wheels locked, with nothing anyone could do to stop it.

Frightening!

Network Rail plan to have all the core machines converted to rail-wheel-brakes by October. It can’t come soon enough...

Many thanks to Paul Conway, James Allenden, Norman Jordan and their team for organising a very interesting demonstration.

march 2012 | the rail engineer | 43

earthworks

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44 | the rail engineer | march 2012

earthworks

Managing

Earthworks

writer

Chris Parker Emergency stabilisation at Merstham, Surrey.

(Right) Rock fall at Folkestone Warren.

Rail has an ever more pressing N etwork need to manage infrastructure assets so as to minimise their whole life cost. That clearly includes the cost of failures and the resulting train delays and cancellations as well as the cost of responding to incidents and remedying the damage they cause. The company is working increasingly closely with its customers, and so it is also very aware of the non fiscal aspects of failure and disruption, such as the reputational damage to its image and the image of train operators, as well as the loss of custom to alternative modes.

Discussions about these matters go back to the Railtrack days and even earlier, when senior managers wanted to know how to avoid unexpected disruption from embankment failures on the WCML. There was no easy answer, given that there were far too many miles of known suspect banks for it to be economic to strengthen them all before they failed.

Today, Graham Birch is Network Rail Senior Asset Engineer (Geotechnics), based at Croydon. He and his colleagues have been carrying out important work to improve the management of railway earthworks assets, in the south-east of the country in particular.

His team is now applying measures which, for his area of the country at least, are beginning to offer ways to economically monitor and manage embankments and cutting slopes. The first objective is to ensure that likely trouble spots are identified and remedial action is taken before a damaging failure occurs. The second is to have in place monitoring systems on suspect sites not yet rectified that can give warning of failure before it causes an incident with traffic, ensuring rail safety. Third is the need to understand the reasons for instability so as to develop the most cost effective remedial strategy for each site.

Understanding history It is necessary to understand the geological history of the area concerned before one can begin to understand the earthworks constructed there. The history of the earthworks themselves is equally important. The natural materials exposed in cutting faces when the railways were built were laid down millions of years ago. The railways in the UK were built around 150 years ago, so the cuttings were dug and the embankments built at that time.

Consequently, there are marked differences in geotechnical properties, and thus engineering behaviour, between the materials exposed in the cutting faces and those within the embankments.

In this country, there was opposition to the construction of railways from wealthy landowners and operators of the existing canal system. This caused difficulty in carrying out topographic surveys of the routes, requiring, in some cases, the employment of prize fighters to protect the survey teams, and even necessitating surveying by moonlight to avoid gangs of objectors. These constraints, in conjunction with the pressure to minimise land-take, resulted in side slopes being overly steep on

embankments and in cuttings. A further consequence is in the necessity for diversion of the lines from the optimum routes to skirt around estate boundaries; Hatfield Curve and the bend in Oxted Tunnel may both be examples, but there are many others.

Embankments were usually built by end tipping the material arising from the nearest cutting with no prior surface preparation.

The fill was therefore a random mix of whatever came along, placed without consolidation onto an inadequate base. Not surprisingly many banks failed during construction, and those that didn’t often still give trouble today in poor track geometry and worse.

UK railway builders were pioneers, and in many ways they were learning as they went along; in engineering, and in managing the political climate, the challenges were novel and errors were made. When construction moved abroad the climate was generally politically more favourable; the railways were able to use more land and choose better alignments. Lessons had been learned about the engineering too, and so better design and construction standards were possible.

march 2012 | the rail engineer | 45

earthworks Physical geography The surface physiography is dictated by the underlying geology of the area. In the UK, south and east of a line roughly between the Severn and Humber estuaries, overconsolidated clays have a significant impact on the earthworks. These clays are sensitive to moisture change and respond by shrinking, as they dry, and swelling when rewetted. London Clay and Weald Clay are the most widespread, but Gault Clay is the most moisture sensitive.

The orientation of rail lines in SE England relative to the geological structure or ‘grain’ is a factor in determining how likely it is that a route will be affected by the moisture sensitive clays. Wessex’s primary routes run southwest-northeast and are largely clear of the clays, but Kent’s primary routes are heavily susceptible because they run eastwest, parallel to the axis of the Wealden Anticline, and tend to stay on either chalk or clay throughout. Sussex’s primary routes run north-south, roughly at right angles to the grain and so cross the clays quickly and pass onto sounder geology.

The winter of 2000/2001 was exceptionally wet, causing 160 failures of earthworks in the South East. Initially it was the clay embankments that failed due to excessive moisture content but, as the rainfall continued, cutting slopes outside the clay areas also began to fail. This period was effectively one of ‘destructive testing’ and provided fresh insight into the preparatory processes and triggering factors in earthworks failures.

GISmos and chains Asset management of Network Rail’s earthworks begins with examination in accordance with Standard NR/L3/CIV/065, Examination of Earthworks. The examinations are carried out by consultants using hand-held electronic data gathering devices linked to satellites and loaded with bespoke software such as “GISmo” (Geographical Information System Mobile).

Examiners use drop-down menus to ensure that the data gathered is as objective as possible, so they can make like for like comparisons between routes.

Every five chain lengths (~100m) of route is categorised by condition as Serviceable, Marginal or Poor. Those in the first category are re-examined every 10 years, and those in

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the second are re-examined every five. Poor earthworks are subjected to further evaluation, to confirm the consultants’ score, and then prioritised to determine which sites need to be passed on for monitoring or remediation. This is how the business plan is populated.

LiDAR (Light Detection And Ranging) surveys are used to obtain detailed surface contour data and subsurface information is obtained by Ground Investigation using

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46 | the rail engineer | march 2012

Crooked Brook, Sussex.

(Right) Improved drainage at Honiton Cutting, Devon.

state-of-the art slope-climbing rigs for sampling the steep faces of earthworks, and road/rail truck-mounted Cone Penetrometer Test rigs for drilling through the 4-foot, such as that operated by Lankelma, which is capable of doing a 20 metre test in half an hour.

Monitoring of Poor earth structures may use conventional techniques, such as boreholes equipped with piezometers and inclinometers, but more sophisticated means of obtaining real-time condition data remotely are under development.

Especially steep slopes can be instrumented to give real time warnings of hazards as well as to provide engineering data. Pull wires attached to slope netting are used at Hooley Cutting, Sussex, to detect the accumulation of debris behind the containment netting. Alarm thresholds are set to alert selected managers to an incident via the mobile phone system and webcams can be checked from any computer as a back up. Between Folkestone and Dover in Kent, where the railway runs along the seaward side of the 150 metre high Chalk sea cliffs, there are signal wires attached to a rockfall detection fence which automatically set the signals to danger in the event of a cliff fall incident.

Trees hold up banks - don’t they?

Vegetation has an important influence on earthwork behaviour. Contrary to common belief, trees do not hold up the banks. Whilst this may be applicable to natural slopes or engineered highways earthworks, it is not applicable to the over-steepened cutting and embankment slopes on the railway

earthworks

infrastructure. Field trials on clay cored embankments have demonstrated ground disturbance to be 10 times greater where trees are present compared to grass. Also, tree roots typically penetrate five times further than those of grass.

Given that clays shrink and swell in response to seasonal variations in moisture content, it is easy to appreciate how the presence of trees can exacerbate the effects of seasonal moisture variations, in particular at the desiccation part of the cycle when the presence of trees can give rise to poor track geometry and ultimately speed restrictions. Vegetation has other detrimental effects for railways, particularly in the case of trees on cutting faces, as we well know. It is thus important to manage vegetation, remove trees from slopes and discourage their re-growth.

Climate change is tending to increase the number and potential severity of weather related incidents. Dryer summers, wetter winters and more days of heavy rain clearly imply more problems with earth structures.

Monitoring moisture As mentioned before, weather has a major influence on earthworks.

Clay behaviour is affected by its moisture content and the greater the deviation from normal, the greater is that influence, be it extremely wet or extremely dry. Of particular interest is the relationship between rainfall, Soil Moisture Deficit (SMD) and earthwork behaviour.

Rainfall information is obtained from the

Meteorological Office and compared to the local Long Term Average (LTA).

The SMD parameter was originally developed by the Met Office for agricultural use. However, research at Imperial College into the failure of London Underground’s clay embankments highlighted the potential for its use in monitoring the condition of clay-cored embankments which are subject to seasonal shrink-swell processes.

“Earthworks Watch” is a system developed

by Graham and his colleagues to inform asset managers, maintainers, emergency response contractors and others in the SE area about the likely condition of their earth structures. It allows them to better understand their assets and to plan and respond more effectively to likely changes. It is based upon 12 years of monitoring in the south east of England by Network Rail, and is proving an effective management tool.

The system looks at five key variables: • Asset type (cutting…at grade… embankment) • Geology (granular/rock…cohesive/clays) • Condition (serviceable…marginal…poor) • Moisture content (SMD) (saturated… normal…desiccated) • Vegetation type (trees…grass).

Rainfall is also recorded relative to the long term average for the site. The system presents users with three indicators: ground condition, condition trend and earthwork response. These are presented on the Network Rail portal weekly in map form and monthly as a full graphical display of the data.

The system is, in Graham’s view, of greatest benefit south of the imaginary line between the Severn and Humber estuaries as elsewhere the bedrock types are different and not generally susceptible to the same sort of analysis. However, Hydrologically Effective Rainfall (HER), a measure of excessive water after the SMD value has reached zero (i.e. saturation), is a further parameter which is being assessed for its potential to predict the propensity for flooding and scour in the non-clay materials prevalent elsewhere in the UK.

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48 | the rail engineer | march 2012

earthworks

writer

Phil Sowden Severn Valley Railway

Renewingcentury-old infrastructure

(Top) Laying sleepers in the tunnel.

Removing track at the Bewdley end.

Severn Valley Railway (SVR) is a T hestandard gauge, heritage railway, predominantly operated by steam locomotives, running between Bridgnorth in Shropshire and Kidderminster in Worcestershire. The railway regularly carries more than 200,000 passengers each year.

SVR operations began in 1970 between Bridgnorth and Hampton Loade, a distance of approximately 5 miles. The line was extended in stages to its current length of 16 miles when trains began running into a brand new station constructed by the Severn Valley at Kidderminster, adjacent to the Network Rail station.

Storm damage During 2007, the railway suffered major storm damage which resulted in closure of the line between Bridgnorth and Bewdley while repairs were carried out. Damage occurred to the line in more than 40 locations, but at seven of these, significant

work was required including the rebuilding of embankments using reinforced earth and soil nailing techniques. The cost of the repairs was £3,700,000 and the railway was fully reopened after nine months.

Since reopening at Easter 2008, the railway has carried out a number of significant infrastructure projects amounting to virtually £1.5 million. These have included: • Major work on the main Worcester Road rail-over-road bridge at Kidderminster which involved digging down to expose the arch of the bridge and also included minor work on an adjacent bridge and the replacement of approximately 1/3 mile of life expired bull head track with new, continuously welded, flat bottom rail; • Work on the steam locomotive repair facilities at Bridgnorth including the “rescue” of a locomotive wheel drop (capable of taking wheels up to 6’ 9” diameter) from the former Leicester locomotive shed and its restoration and installation at Bridgnorth; • The design, build and installation of a traditional-style passenger footbridge spanning three tracks at Highley Station; • The installation of a new drainage system through Arley Station which required the removal of all trackwork and formation through the platforms, demolition of both platform faces, provision of new deep drainage followed by the replacement of the formation and trackwork and the rebuilding of new platform faces and surfaces in a traditional pattern; • The removal of the double track formation across a ten arch sandstone viaduct at Bewdley followed by the provision of new drainage, a concrete deck with waterproofing and the replacement of all track and formation.

Renewal plans During the first few weeks of 2012, major work has been carried out in the vicinity of the tunnel between Bewdley and Kidderminster. This work involved the provision of a new drainage system and the replacement of all track through the tunnel, and the renewal of additional track for approximately 600 feet in the Bewdley direction.

The single bore tunnel was constructed by the contractor Charles Dickinson in 1876 under the supervision of GWR engineer Edward Wilson. The tunnel is just over 478 yards long and passes through a ridge of red sandstone. Various problems occurred following its construction which resulted in it being partially brick lined. The GWR carried out a full relining of the tunnel between 3rd August and 20 October 1910 and an article describing the relining appeared in the Great Western Railway Magazine of December 1910.

Comparatively little engineering work has been carried out on the tunnel structure since then. The drainage through the tunnel has now failed and this, in turn, has led to contamination of the ballast and sleeper failure. The existing bull head rail through the tunnel has also reached the point at which replacement is necessary. Fortunately the main tunnel structure and brickwork is in good condition.

Preparations A specification for the work was produced during summer 2011 and a number of contractors were invited to bid for the work.

Tenders were submitted and once these had been evaluated a preferred contractor, Walsh Construction from Worcestershire, was selected to carry out the civils part of the

march 2012 | the rail engineer | 49

earthworks contract. The Severn Valley Railway inhouse permanent way department was responsible for the trackwork aspects of the contract.

Tunnel work was carried out between 3 January and 10 February 2012 when the line was closed to all traffic. Trains operated during the school half term week of 11 to 19 February after which further Monday to Friday possessions took place to permit completion and tidying of the site. The project has a budget of £250,000, including track replacement, and is scheduled to be completed by 16 March.

Initial work was carried out during November 2011 to install linear soakaways within the cesses at both ends of the tunnel in readiness for the connection to the main tunnel drain.

Each soakaway is 40 metres long with a depth of 1.2 metres, lined with geotextile and including 100mm perforated pipes and 40mm aggregate fill. Some repairs were also made to the brickwork of the tunnel refuges. It was essential that this work did not jeopardise either the railway’s weekend running or the Santa operation - when about 30,000 passengers travelled on the line during the weekends in December to visit Santa in his Grotto at Arley.

Work in progress The first stage was the removal of signalling and telecommunication cables through the tunnel, after which track lifting commenced from the Bewdley end of the site. Once the track had been lifted Walsh Construction removed the ballast and began installation of the new drainage system.

This consisted of longitudinal 100mm perforated pipes with rodable inspection pots at 100m centres set 400mm below sleeper level along both sides of the track. Once the drainage was installed, the Walsh Construction team

placed bottom ballast in readiness for the SVR track gang to follow them through the tunnel.

The tunnel has a prevailing gradient of 1 in 100 and was force ventilated during the work using a fan system supplied by Factair Ltd. Background and specific task lighting was also required. Plant and machinery for carrying out the drainage work was sourced by the main contractor but the SVR utilised its own road rail machines for the track relaying. The nearest road access to the site was approximately 700 metres from the Kidderminster tunnel portal.

The bull head rail and sleepers through the tunnel were removed to the Kidderminster end of the site for temporary storage, sorting and scrapping by the SVR. Flat bottom rail (113lbs) was installed on concrete sleepers throughout the tunnel and for 10 lengths on the Bewdley side (35 panels / 2100 ft in total). Initially, jointed rail was used in order to facilitate completion of the work for the half-term holidays, but this was subsequently welded during weekday possessions to produce CWR.

The rail was sourced from Network Rail as part of their disposals policy having been cascaded down from the east coast main line. The rail was inspected and ultrasonically tested by the SVR at Whitemoor recycling centre before purchase and delivery to site. Sleepers were obtained from two primary sources.

Ballast was clean 40mm sourced from Clee Hill. Once laid, the track was tamped, finishing at 21:30 on 10th February so as to be ready for operations to resume the following morning.

New concealed signalling and telecommunication cables were installed during the work throughout the length of the work site and these were tested and commissioned prior to the resumption of passenger services on 11 February.

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(Below) A load of sleepers for track inside the tunnel passes Factair’s ventilation fan.

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50 | the rail engineer | march 2012

earthworks

writer

Clive Kessell

Boulders

Rolling

have been several instances over T here the years where trains have hit debris that has fallen onto a track and caused a derailment. In high risk areas, it is not uncommon for avalanche shelters to be built which are strong enough to withstand the force of anything that can roll down a hillside. These can frequently be seen in the Alpine areas of Switzerland and Austria and some exist in the UK, the Cambrian line just south of Fairbourne being an example where rock falls from the cliffs of Friog have, in the past, caused trains to derail and plummet into the sea.

The Pass of Brander Accident Scotland has its fair share of high risk spots and, on the 6 June 2010, a train from Glasgow to Oban hit a boulder in the Pass of Brander just west of Falls of Cruachan station (see the rail engineer issue 69 July 2010). The front coach of the 2 car DMU derailed to the left and could have rolled down the embankment onto the A85 road and into Loch Awe if trees and vegetation had not prevented its passage. The section was equipped with an automatic stone guard system consisting of 10 single strand ‘piano’ wires which, if any were broken, would replace to danger one or more of 17

semaphore ‘stone’ signals either side of the break. Such was the perceived risk that this detection system had been installed in stages by the Caledonian Railway between 1893 and 1913. In 2010, however, the

displaced boulder had tumbled from below this wire screen and thus was not detected.

The subsequent RAIB investigation produced recommendations for a better inspection, maintenance and recording regime including the production of new standards. No comment was made on the effectiveness of the detection system, nor whether an improved system should be investigated.

A New Detection Concept To protect against any immediate repeat of the incident, major geological protection work was authorised and QTS was awarded a contract to clear vegetation, improve the drainage and fettle up the piano wire detection system. QTS are a private company specialising in lineside management, the initials originally meaning quality tree surgeons, but now more realistically standing for Quality Technical Services. All this represents good precautionary measures but Network Rail in Scotland believed that a more effective means of detection was possible. Could lessons be learnt from elsewhere?

It came to light that BT had used fibre optic cables to detect rock falls on to roads, so this concept was investigated. The principle is based upon a fibre having a marginal change in its refractive index if a vibration occurs. This can be detected by the injected light source being partially reflected at the vibration point, which in turn can be calculated by distance from the light source.

Fibre optic cable faults are located in a similar manner, using an optical time domain reflectometer. In theory, the bigger the ‘thump’, the bigger the refraction change. More ferreting yielded the information that the principle had been tried in Yorkshire to detect cable thieves since the removal of trough lids and any disturbance of cables would cause a fibre to ‘blip’. This trial was mostly successful and may well be taken further.

Accordingly, a contract has been let via BT to Fotech Solutions, a company based in Fleet, Hampshire, to undertake a ‘Proof of Concept’. This involves setting up a trial site, establishing a testing methodology, rolling different sizes of boulders down a hill, measuring the disturbance on a controlled length of fibre optic cable and producing a set of test results with accompanying analysis.

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52 | the rail engineer | march 2012

earthworks Next Steps It looks like the ‘proof of concept’ trial will be successful. If so, the next stage will be to install 400m of fibre cable in the Falls of Cruachan area, including through the Pass of Brander, and connect this to onsite test equipment.

This will establish how well the system performs on a real railway and will evaluate the profiles of normal vibration likely to be encountered.

Assuming this is able to pick out unusual events, then a third stage will be embarked on by extending the fibre cable to a 20km length through this whole section of the Oban route and terminating it in an RETB repeater site.

The associated equipment room will be provided with a line that can support ISDN or IP connections, thus enabling the alarms to be monitored from a central point.

Future Potential

The Trials Underway Getting a suitable test site has not been easy but QTS came to the rescue by creating a small artificial length of railway at their Rench Farm depot site near Drumclog, half way between Hamilton and Kilmarnock. A hillside has been constructed replicating the Pass of Brander and 30 boulders of varying sizes have been made from drums filled with concrete and coated with plastic. The fibre optic cable layout is a laser light source and sensor located in an adjacent test hut connected firstly to a 1km reel of mono mode fibre, then secondly to a fibre in a 400m length of fibre cable as used on the FTN (Fixed Telecoms Network) project, thirdly to a 5km reel of fibre and lastly to a second 400m length of fibre cable.

The fibre cable is run outside at the foot of the ballast shoulder on both sides of the test track. The light source uses the standard 1540 nm wavelength common on optical transmission systems. Coupled to this test length are the various measuring equipments with the resultant fibre performance being shown graphically by distance on a laptop computer. Fotech claim that a vibration can be detected to a distance of 2½ metres in a 10 km length.

An important element of the trial is to distinguish, within a reasonable degree of accuracy, the difference between normal vibrations as would be caused by a passing train, or even someone walking in close proximity, and a boulder rolling down the hillside and fouling the track, hence the

importance of testing different size and weight boulders. Another variable will be the height above rail level that the boulder commences its descent. Facilitated by QTS staff, Fotech are arranging test heights of 2, 5, 7 and 10 metres. The smallest boulders can be lifted into place by hand but the big ones need a ‘grabber’ JCB perched on the hill top to place them in position.

Once the go signal is given, the boulder careers down the hill towards the track; the smaller ones tend to ride over the cess, bounce off the rail and return to the cess; the bigger ones ride the cess and stop with a clang against the rail. Any train would hit these with considerable force. A boulder was not observed to climb the rail into the 4 foot but this is obviously possible since it happened at the Pass of Brander.

Back in the test hut, the rollings are observed by a strong peak on the fibre measurement graph. Since the fibre exists on both sides of the rail, two peaks are observed. These peaks can be captured and used to trigger an alarm. Records are being kept of the exact position where the various boulders come to rest. Further tests will involve a road-railer vehicle being put on the track and moved up and down to compare this with the vibrations caused by the boulders.

Whilst it is acknowledged that much testing / proving has still to be done, this system could completely change the way the problems of falling boulders and other obstructions are managed. If successful, the ancient and difficult to maintain piano wire system will be abolished. It is frequently triggered by deer and walkers so few will miss it. Beyond that, the Network Rail geotechnical group will consider installing similar equipment at other high risk locations.

With the roll out of the FTN, most rail routes now have a fibre optic cable installed trackside. A spare fibre within these cables can be utilised for the detection system obviating the need to run out a dedicated cable. Significant cost advantages will result.

The means by which and to where the alarm signals are sent and interpreted will need careful thought. Too many false alarms will quickly give the system a bad name. The opportunity for using the technology to detect cable theft has already been mentioned. It may however be some time before that full potential is realised.

Thanks are expressed to Ian Findlay, the senior project engineer at Network Rail, Phil Jones from QTS for managing the site visit and facilitating the boulder drops and Lindsay McInnes from Fotech for being the onsite brain and explaining the technology.

march 2012 | the rail engineer | 53

feature

Gröna Tåget writer

Nigel

Wordsworth Swedes are very good at T hecollaboration.

So it should be no surprise that a project to develop a new concept of train that is economical, environmentally friendly and able to withstand the rigours of a Nordic winter should be developed in Sweden.

The Green Train (in Swedish - Gröna Tåget) is a research and development programme which brings together institutes of higher education, infrastructure managers, railway companies and train manufacturers in a common programme. Since its inception in 2005 the objective has been to develop a concept proposal for a new, attractive high-speed train adapted to Nordic conditions that is flexible for several different tasks on the railway and interoperable in the Scandinavian countries.

The proposal is intended to act as a bank of ideas, recommendations and technical solutions for railway companies, track managers and the manufacturing industry.

It is an open source, which means that it is accessible to all conceivable stakeholders.

The research programme has already attracted the interest of the industry both in Sweden and other countries. However, despite the name, there is no finished Green Train. It exists as two weighty reports on the concepts and findings of the project.

Partners A number of organisations contributed to the project, but the main ones were Trafikverket (the Swedish Transport Administration), Bombardier Transportation Sweden, the Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), and the Swedish state railway operator SJ.

[groe:na ‘tɔ:gɛt] Christer Löfving of Trafikverket explains.

“Since 1988, the Swedish railway sector has changed a lot in terms of organisation, management and responsibilities. A new infrastructure manager has been created and a number of new operators have been established. However, most of those operators are too small to carry out their own vehicle R&D work, so universities and research institutes have taken over much of that railway research.

“By rolling several of these research programmes together, we set up the Green Train Research and Development

The Regio 250 Development train.

54 | the rail engineer | march 2012

The new SJ3000 train.

(Below) Monitoring performance on the Regio 250.

feature

Lower fares

Programme. Its aim was to develop a train concept and technologies to provide more attractive, efficient and still more climatefriendly train services for long-distance and fast regional traffic. At the same time, we wanted to influence the development of European standards and train concepts for Nordic conditions while maintaining and further strengthening our competence to develop trains in Sweden by involving as many organisations as possible within the Swedish railway sector into the programme.”

One of the most interesting investigations was to see whether the application of new technology could bring passenger fares down. Larger trains, carrying more passengers more economically, should reduce operator costs and allow them to reduce fares.

With the X2000 train needing replacement in ten years, and with the railway system facing mounting passenger criticism for unreliability in winter conditions, this was

A comprehensive range of subjects was to be considered as part of the project. These included: • Economy and capacity • Market, train services and conceptual design • Attractive and functional passenger environment • Environment - energy and noise attenuation • Track-friendly running gear and suspension • Carbody tilt • Nordic weather conditions • Aerodynamics • Electric propulsion and current collection • Safety and the driver’s environment • Train maintenance • Standards for European and Nordic countries.

not going to be purely an academic exercise.

Tohmmy Bustad of Trafikverket explains the concept that came out of the project: “The Green Train is a collection of ideas, proposals and technical solutions that suit the Nordic market well. We concluded that a fast, tilting electric multiple unit train which can run at up to 250 km/h on conventional lines and maintain higher speed than conventional trains on curves was the best solution. A special high-speed version should also be suitable for about 320 km/h on future dedicated high-speed lines. The train must be accessible to all regardless of age or ability, have a flexible train length, and be track-friendly as well as attractive and cost effective.

“This will result in shorter travelling times and lower costs, enabling operators to charge lower fares. An attractive, functional

passenger environment with a high level of comfort for all is most important so that travellers choose the train instead of other modes of transport.”

Wayward elk The Nordic countries have some special conditions which make the job of train operators more difficult. Oskar Fröidh of KTH, author of Part A of the final report, listed some of these. “Harsh Winter Conditions” was in first place - no surprise there. However, second was “Elk and Deer on the Line” - apparently in times of deep snow these large animals find that railway lines make excellent pathways!

The rest of Oskar’s list is more predictable.

Conventional lines include some new links with speeds of up to 250 kph, but there are many sinuous slower lines with mixed heavy freight and passenger traffic.

However, Sweden, as well as Norway, Finland and parts of Denmark, is fortunate to have a wider loading gauge even than continental Europe. To date that advantage hasn’t been utilised, but the Green Train concept will have seats five across (3+2) in a cabin 3.5 metres wide. This will give 25% more seats than a continental carriage with 300 seats in a train just 108 metres long (a comparable continental train would be 134 metres long, while the current X2000 is 165 metres). The wide-body trains will have 15% lower total costs than narrower trains (and 20-25% lower than the X2000).

In Oskar’s opinion, this lower cost base will allow modern trains to compete with airlines on short to medium length routes, and attract passengers out of their cars and onto rail.

Practical evaluation Having come up with a series of proposals and concepts, work was needed to start to develop and evaluate these ideas.

Bombardier Transportation modified a Regina 250 train to act as a test bed while remaining in regular passenger service. This allowed new technology to be assessed in real-life situations and to be exposed to the rigours of revenue-paying service and the Swedish winter.

One of the prime components to go through this process was a new bogie. Based on 25 years of experience with the concept, this is a self-steering bogie which reduces lateral forces on the track by 40%, so reducing wear and rolling resistance.

march 2012 | the rail engineer | 55

feature

Developed from lower speed designs, the new bogie is certified for 250kph and has been tested at 303kph on a track designed for only 200kph running. The new bogie has been tested under the Regio 250 for over 500,000 km of in-service running without problems.

Active suspension is another new development. It keeps the car body centred, allowing use of the maximum gauge width, and also gives better stability in crosswinds and on curves. The result is also a more comfortable ride for passengers and once again this has been tested for 500,000 km.

The use of permanent magnet motors,

developed by Bombardier in Sweden at the Västerås facility, has saved weight, given the train a better power-to-weight ratio and simplified the cooling requirements.

Snow and ice Winterisation is not a specifically Swedish problem, but it is vital in this northern country. “At low temperatures, snow gets in everywhere - you can’t stop it” comments Henrik Tengstrand of Bombardier Transportation. “It comes in the cooling ducts, and anywhere else it can find. Once inside the train, or on the external equipment, it goes through cycles of

freezing and melting, humidity and condensation. We even can get the underbody bombarded by stones from ballast excited by dropping ice from the train. We design to prevent it, but we still need regular deicing.”

A good aerodynamic shape helps, and thousand of virtual wind tunnel tests have resulted in a shape that has 20-30% lower drag and uses 10-15% less energy than earlier designs. “The final shape is always a compromise,” Tengstrand adds. “The best outline for low drag resistance is not necessarily good for crosswind stability, and vice versa. However, we have had Bombardier’s best people on the problem - 5 divisions of the company in 6 different countries have been involved in the project and we are happy with the finished result.”

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(Above) Regio 250 feels the cold.

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56 | the rail engineer | march 2012

(Top) Regio 250 at Ornskoldsvik.

(Right) SJ3000 ready to leave Stockholm Central.

(Below) Wide body of SJ3000.

(Right) Wheelchair access lift.

In fact, having multiple partners has allowed the team to call on a large number of engineers and academics, all at PhD-level, so blurring the distinction between the two.

The name “Green Train” implies that there is an environmental aspect to the project.

Reducing the energy consumption forms part of this, as does an important exercise to reduce noise. On the train, the use of improved wheel designs and bogie skirts had a significant effect resulting in the test train at 250kph emitting no more noise than a conventional passenger train at 160kph and a freight train at 100kph. Infrastructure engineers got in on the act as well, and in sensitive areas tuned rail dampers, combined with a low height barrier close to the track and the aforementioned bogie skirts, reduced noise levels still further.

Energy-saving techniques on which the rail engineer has reported before have also been employed. Regenerative braking and eco-driver management systems are both part of the Green Train concept.

The design of the train’s interior hasn’t been neglected. A team of 16 students of Konstfack, the University College of Arts, Crafts and Design, have worked on the project under the guidance of Olle Lundberg. Thin-backed seating designs maximised legroom for passengers, and the wide body allowed for 3+2 seating in economy class and 2+2 in first class.

Luggage and wheelchair facilities were taken into account, and a special entrance lobby with a low floor and an integral wheelchair lift designed. “In winter, people have a lot of coats”, added Lundberg, “and we had to find space for them as well.”

feature

New train So that is the Green Train. A concept more than a finished design, a test bed not a new class. However, the new concepts are already bearing fruit as can be seen from Swedish Railway’s newest train - the SJ3000.

Built by Bombardier, which knows it as the X55, this new four-car set entered service in February 2012.

Externally, some of the Green Train’s pedigree can be seen as several winterisation ideas have been included in the design. The cab front is smooth without any gaps between panels which could become packed with snow and ice. The windscreen wiper parks vertically so snow won’t gather on it, and the light clusters are on the outboard edge of the front panel, so when snow slides down off the heated windscreen, it doesn’t obscure the lights.

The coupler has a cover that has to be removed before use, but which stops snow and ice entering into the mechanism. There is an integral rubber gaiter for the same reason. The bogies are also specially engineered. All the cables and hydraulic pipes are tucked neatly out of sight, again to

prevent ice build-up, and the bump stops are angled and plastic-covered so any ice will break up easily and slide off.

On the train sides, air intakes are located right up at the edge of the roof, to keep them away from the powdered snow that blows around the train while it is in motion.

Under the frames are big open spaces so that snow can swirl around and fall away, without compacting on under-floor mounted equipment.

Inside, the car body is wide and spacious, although the seating is only 2+2 in both first and second class. There is a bistro car reminiscent of one from a Virgin Pendolino, and a fancy lift mechanism to get wheelchairs from ground level up to the main aisle.

So parts of the Green Train are now in service. No doubt more of the technology will follow in years to come.

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58 | the rail engineer | march 2012

feature

Talking about Trains writer

David Shirres (Top) Talking about trains exhibitions.

(Right) “The great and the good” a case in the exhibition. (Far right) Bill Reeve.

its world famous collection, York’s W ithNational Railway Museum (NRM) is truly a Mecca for railways enthusiasts.

Impressive though its locomotives are, the museum’s small exhibits can be equally worthy of the visitor’s interest. This is certainly true of the eight cases forming the NRM’s “Talking about Trains” exhibition celebrating the birth of the Institution of Locomotive Engineers (ILocoE) in 1911. In 1969, it amalgamated with the Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IMechE) to become the IMechE’s Railway Division.

The exhibition was opened on 17 January

by Steve Davies, Director of the NRM, and Bill Reeve, Chairman of the IMechE’s Railway Division. Bill was glad to see today’s Railway Division continuing the traditions which were started a hundred years ago; to promote railway engineering excellence and give today’s engineers the opportunity to develop their skills. Although technology changes, the basic engineering challenges remain and he was confident that today’s railway engineers could match the achievements of their predecessors.

In his address, Steve acknowledged the engineers contribution, with Mallard’s 126 mph steam speed record in 1938 being a good example. The NRM is to celebrate next year’s 75th anniversary when two preserved A4 locomotives are to be shipped from North America to join the UK’s four preserved A4s and the NRM’s Mallard. These celebrations, together with NRM’s Railfest in June will be a treat for anyone interested in

steam locomotive traction. He encouraged those wanting further information to consult the museum’s website www.nrm.org.uk.

Eight months in the planning, the exhibition is open until 15th April and includes exhibits from the Museum’s collection and the IMechE’s Library. These provide a wealth of information about the history of the Institution, its Engineers, the railway industry and today’s Railway Division.

The Institution of Locomotive Engineers At the end of the nineteenth century, there was little information available to help those who wanted to know more about railway rolling stock, so self improvement groups were started at major railway centres. In 1909, the Stephenson Locomotive Society was formed to cater for both enthusiasts and professionals. Feeling that this did not adequately address technical issues, George Frank Burtt of the London, Brighton and South Coast Railway led a breakaway group of London-based railway companies to form a new society, the Junior Institution of Locomotive Engineers, which first met on 4 February 1911. With senior engineers joining, the prefix Junior was dropped. By 1911, the ILocoE had a membership of 52.

At first costs were minimal with meetings held in company offices, but with increasing activity a Finance Committee was set up. In 1915 the Institution had 178 members and

was incorporated as an Association Not for Profit with the principle objective being “The advancement of the science and practice of Locomotive Engineering by enquiry, experiment or other means; the diffusion of knowledge regarding Locomotive Engineering by means of lectures, publications, exchange of information and otherwise; the improvement of the status of the Locomotive Engineer”.

Membership and activities rapidly expanded with the first regional centres being established in Leeds (1918), Manchester (1919) and Glasgow (1920). By 1921, membership was 1120 and a Library was founded. Presentation and discussion of papers at each of these centres was an important activity. From 1915 these were published in the ILocoE’s journal which reported the discussions verbatim. Together with a full programme of UK and overseas visits and social events such as the annual luncheon, the Institution was clearly meeting its objective.

Six of the Institution’s Presidents (Henry Fowler, Edwin Kitson Clark, Nigel Gresley, William Stanier, Oliver Bulleid and Roland Bond) also served as IMechE Presidents, a reflection of the close links between the two Institutions. It was first suggested that the two Institutions should merge in the 1920s but agreement could not be reached on a number of issues. By the 1960s it was becoming clear that the ILocoE could not continue as an independent body and so, in 1969, the two Institutions amalgamated with the ILocoE becoming the IMechE’s Railway Division.

march 2012 | the rail engineer | 59

feature

(Left) Institution’s visit to Germany in 1936. (Bottom) Commemorative badge from the Institution’s 1936 visit to Germany.

International Affairs From the start the ILocoE had an interest in overseas practice and developed international connections. The first paper presented to the Institution on 27 May 1911 was “French Locomotive Practice”, and later that year there were visits to Belgium, Austria and Germany.

In 1920, the first overseas centre was established in Buenos Aires. Around this time ILocoE representatives were appointed in India, Nigeria, South Africa and China. Further overseas Centres were established in Calcutta (1930) and Western Australia (1932).

A visit to Germany in 1936 took place three weeks after the Reichsbahn’s 4-6-4 steam locomotive had achieved a 124.5 • 05.002 • • •

mph speed record. This visit included a trip hauled by this locomotive at up to 118 mph.

Steve Davies considers that this visit arguably led to Mallard’s 126mph record two years later beating its German rival by 1.5 mph, truly a close run thing! To modern eyes the swastikas in exhibits from this visit appear sinister. However, despite the growing divide between Britain and ••Germany, the ••engineers •• had •a close

relationship. One exhibit is the paper presented to the Institution in 1935 “High Speed and the Steam Locomotive” by Richard Wagner, the Reichsbahn’s Chief Mechanical Engineer. German engineers also joined the ILocoE’s 1938 summer meeting in Scotland.

The IMechE Railway Division has continued the tradition of overseas visits.

With the globalisation of the rail industry in more recent times, it has arranged visits well beyond Europe to Singapore, Malaysia, USA, Japan and China.

All Sides of Industry The Institution provided an important forum between Britain’s manufacturing industry and engineers running Britain’s railways. Presidential addresses showing the value of this forum include those by Richard

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60 | the rail engineer | march 2012

feature

(Right) Sir Nigel Gresley, ILocoE President 1927-28 and 1934-35. (Far right) A4 Locomotive on static test plant at Rugby. (Below) Southern Railway locomotive Lord Nelson with wooden testing station on front buffer beam.

Maunsell (1916) and William Stanier (1938) who both highlighted maintenance problems from poor design. Maunsell’s strong views are reflected in his paper’s conclusion “the engineer instinctively looks for the prominence of details which he knows should be accessible and he rightly regards as a monstrosity a machine which is lacking in this respect”.

In 1921 the Institution elected its first President from the locomotive manufacturing industry, Lt-Col Kitson Clark of Kitson and Co. Presidents followed from Vulcan Foundry, Beyer Peacock, Hunslet, English Electric and the North British Locomotive Company. This once strong industry provided the Institution with a great deal of support. Unfortunately, its decline resulted in a significant loss of advertising in the Journal, one of the reasons why the ILocoE was unable to exist as an independent Institution.

A long tradition of meetings with railway infrastructure engineers dates back to the first joint meeting held with the Permanent Way Institution in 1928, when Harold Holcroft presented his paper “Some points of common interest in Rolling Stock & Permanent Way”. In 1949 the first meeting with the Institution of Railway Signal Engineers was held when famous author Oswald S Nock, a member of both Institutions, presented his paper “The relationship between Signalling and Brake Power in the Handling of Modern Traffic”.

Testing Testing With the development of the modern steam locomotive, testing became increasingly important to perfect designs.

Although France, Germany and America had static locomotive testing plants in the 1930s there were none in the UK. Hence testing

required special test trains with dynamometer cars, sometimes with test staff accommodated in wooden testing stations on a locomotive’s front buffer beam.

Gresley devoted his 1928 Presidential address to a plea for a static locomotive plant to be part of Britain’s National Physical Laboratory, which then had expensive facilities for perfecting designs of ships and aeroplanes. Such was Gresley’s belief in static testing facilities that, in 1934, he arranged for his prototype P2 2-8-2 locomotive to be tested at the French test plant in Vitry-sur-Seine near Paris.

Construction of a testing plant at Rugby started in the late 30s. One exhibit is a progress report showing construction to be well advanced by July 1939. Unfortunately, the war delayed completion until 1948, 12 years before production of the UK’s last steam locomotive. Although this limited the plant’s contribution to UK steam locomotive design, it was a useful facility as demonstrated by one exhibit, a 1953 test report on the efficiency of an exhaust steam injector with two types of coal. As this test required 9120 miles of static running it may not have been possible without this static plant.

Changing Times The ILocoE, and subsequently the Railway Division, have had to respond to the many organisational, industrial and technical changes faced by Britain’s railways. In 1948, nationalisation brought about a common locomotive maintenance practice throughout British Railways. President Lt-Col Harold Rudgard’s address “Organising & Carrying Out of Examinations at Running Sheds in Relationship to Locomotive Performance and Availability” outlined LMS practice which was soon adopted throughout British Railways of which an exhibit of an X Exam card provides an example.

The 1950s onwards were a challenging time with diesel and electric motive power replacing steam, the introduction of specialised rolling stock and the manufacturing industry’s decline. One exhibit is the programme for the Institution’s visit to Brush at Loughborough in 1965 showing class 47 locomotive construction.

The ILocoE provided support as engineers adapted to these changes and, in 1957, widened its scope to include carriage and

wagon engineering. With the new motorway network, railway engineers had to combat increased competition from the car. Various exhibits illustrate how the development of the High Speed Train met this challenge. The spirit of this time is exemplified by another exhibit, Bruce Sephton’s 1986 Chairman’s address to the IMechE Railway Division entitled “Railways Do or Die?”.

Today’s Railway Division Today the Railway Division has a membership of 4,226 and runs an extensive programme, including UK and overseas visits with lectures and seminars at HQ and its six Regional Centres (Midlands, South East, South West, North West, Scottish and North East). It also has a thriving young members section with a prize awarded for the best paper. The Division’s Journal of Rail and Rapid Transit attracts research papers from around the world although it contains little that is presented at Railway Division meetings. Instead webcasts of key presentations are available from the “Playitback” page on the IMechE website.

This, no doubt, is a reflection of the internet age and perhaps is the only significant departure from ILocoE traditions.

In this way, the Division continues to act as a learned society promoting best practice in railway engineering, including new rolling stock, international standards and research and development. Its programme encourages the development of today’s engineers, as do its training workshops and prizes awarded for papers and innovations.

The Division’s popularity is such that its Annual Luncheon is held in London’s only hotel that can provide over a 1000 lunches.

Bill Reeve’s confidence in the Railway Division’s success is therefore well justified.

The “Talking About Trains” exhibition contains much to explain this success and is a must for anyone with an interest in railway engineering.

Much of this article was based on a booklet “One Hundred Years of Locomotive and Rolling Stock Engineering” compiled by past Chairman Allan Baker, copies of which are available from the IMechE. Further information is available from the Railway Devision’s website.

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