Page 127 - 360.revista de Alta Velocidad - Nº 5

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número 5 - junio - 2018. Pág 125 - 147

Probabilistic Safety Analysis of High Speed and Conventional

Railway Lines

Grande, Zacarías

Blanco López, Marta

García Tamames, Alberto

Castillo, Enrique

University of Cantabria
1
Spanish Royal Academy of Engineering

Abstract:
A probabilistic safety analysis methodology based on Bayesian network model is
presented, in which all the elements encountered when travelling along a railway
line, such as terrain, infrastructure, tunnels, viaducts, light signals, speed limit
signs, curves, switches, rolling stock, and any other element related to its safety
are reproduced. Especial attention is given to human error and modelling the
driver behaviour variables and their time evolution. The conditional probabilities
of variables given their parents are given by means of closed formulas, which
facilitate the software implementation of the proposed models. The model
provides a probabilistic safety assessment of the line such that its most critical
elements can be identified and sorted by importance. This permits improving
the line safety and optimizing the maintenance program by concentrating on the
most critical elements. To reduce the complexity of the problem, a method is
given that divides the Bayesian network into small parts such that the complexity
of the problem becomes linear in the number of items. In addition, when an
accident occurs, a backward inference process allows us to identify the causes
of incidents. The case of the real Palencia–Santander and Vitoria-Zaragoza lines
together with some other simple examples are used to illustrate the advantages
of the proposed methodology.

Keywords: Bayesian networks, Backward analysis, Partition technique.

1 Grande, Zacarías. University of Cantabria. Email: zgandrade@gmail.com
Blanco López, Marta. University of Cantabria. Email: marta.blancolo@alumnos.unican.es
García Tamames, Alberto. University of Cantabria. Email: alberto.garciat@alumnos.unican.es
Castillo, Enrique. Founder Member of the Spanish Royal Academy of Engineering. Email: castie@unican.es

International Congress on High-speed Rail: Technologies and Long Term Impacts - Ciudad Real (Spain) - 25th anniversary Madrid-Sevilla corridor 125