Special Issue "Sustainable Operation and Maintenance of Railway Systems"

A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). This special issue belongs to the section "Sustainable Transportation".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 November 2021.

Special Issue Editor

Prof. Dr. Luca D’Acierno
E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering, Federico II University of Naples, 80125 Naples, Italy
Interests: transportation planning; transportation network design; simulation of transport systems; mass transit systems; rail transportation; energy-saving strategies; pricing policy analysis
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Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

From a sustainability perspective, the promotion of public transport is one of the main tools to reduce the negative impacts related to private-car transport (pollution, congestion, accidents, etc.).

In this context, railway systems in all their forms (metro, regional, and high-speed services) represent the backbone for the development of a sustainable mobility model.

Since a user is a rational decision-maker who maximizes their utility, abandoning private transport in favor of public transport may take place if and only if the latter is more efficient and more reliable. Therefore, the development of methodologies and techniques to ensure reliability, availability, maintainability, and safety both in an operational and maintenance context of railway systems is a relevant issue for promoting environmental sustainability today.

In light of the above, this Special Issue calls for reviews and original research articles related to the main aspects concerning, but not limited to, the promotion, analysis, and optimization of railway systems in a sustainable perspective by investigating theoretical, methodological, energetical, operational, implemental, and technological aspects.

Prof. Dr. Luca D’Acierno
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All papers will be peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1900 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • sustainable rail-based mobility
  • freight rail-based transport
  • footprint analysis of (regional and/or high-speed) railway and metro systems
  • advanced simulation models and methods for (regional and/or high-speed) railway and metro systems
  • reliability, availability, maintainability, and safety (rams) in (regional and/or high-speed) railway and metro systems
  • railway traffic optimization, control, and management
  • energy-saving, energy recovery, and energy-efficient strategies and technologies
  • artificial neural network adoption
  • data-driven approaches
  • advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) in the (regional and/or high-speed) railway and metro contexts
  • advanced traveler information systems (ATIS) in the (regional and/or high-speed) railway and metro contexts
  • micro-mobility effects on (regional and/or high-speed) railway and metro systems
  • mobility as a service (MaaS) and related implications on (regional and/or high-speed) railway and metro systems
  • innovative propulsion systems for (regional and/or high-speed) railway and metro systems
  • sustainable improvements of tractive power systems based on fossil fuels in the case of (regional and/or high-speed) railway and metro systems
  • effects of pantograph-catenary dynamics on rail-based systems performance
  • effects of wheel-rail contact on rail-based system performance

Published Papers (1 paper)

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Research

Article
A Holistic Analysis of Train-Vehicle Accidents at Highway-Rail Grade Crossings in Florida
Sustainability 2021, 13(16), 8842; https://doi.org/10.3390/su13168842 - 07 Aug 2021
Viewed by 372
Abstract
Highway-rail grade crossing (HRGC) accidents pose a serious risk of safety to highway users, including pedestrians trying to cross HRGCs. A significant increase in the number of HRGC accidents globally calls for greater research efforts, which are not limited to the analysis of [...] Read more.
Highway-rail grade crossing (HRGC) accidents pose a serious risk of safety to highway users, including pedestrians trying to cross HRGCs. A significant increase in the number of HRGC accidents globally calls for greater research efforts, which are not limited to the analysis of accidents at HRGCs but also understanding user perception, driver behavior, potential conflicting areas at crossings, effectiveness of countermeasures and user perception towards them. HRGC safety is one of the priority areas in the State of Florida, since the state HRGCs experienced a total of 429 injuries and 146 fatalities between 2010 and 2019 with a significant increase in HRGC accidents over the last years. The present study aims to conduct a comprehensive analysis of the HRGCs that experienced accidents in Florida over the last years. The databases maintained by the Federal Rail Administration (FRA) are used to gather the relevant information for a total of 578 crossings that experienced at least one accident from 2010 to 2019. In contrast with many of the previous efforts, this study investigates a wide range of various factors, including physical and operational characteristics of crossings, vehicle and train characteristics, spatial characteristics, temporal and environmental characteristics, driver actions and related characteristics, and other relevant information. The outcomes of this research will help better understanding the major causes behind accidents at the HRGCs in the State of Florida in a holistic way by considering a variety of relevant factors, which will assist the appropriate stakeholders with implementation of safety improvement projects across the state. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainable Operation and Maintenance of Railway Systems)
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