Managing disruptions and disturbances on railway services: A real-scale case study

In the case of conventional rail lines, when disruptions occur, dispatchers have the difficult task offinding feasible rescheduling solutions rapidly so as to re-establish ordinary conditions as soon aspossible. Despite the numerous contributions for automatic rescheduling proposed in the literature, thisprocess is still totally controlled by dispatchers who decide according to their personal experience andunder their own responsibility. Indeed, in many cases, it can be more advantageous to let the systemrevert to ordinary conditions without implementing any strategy rather than look for solutions whichcan reduce the discomfort perceived by passengers. In this article we propose a system of modelsfor managing the rail system, combining a microscopic simulation model with an assignment toolwhich is able to consider passenger flows on the network. As a result, the disutility experienced byusers during their trip can be evaluated and feasible intervention strategies can be assessed, taking intoaccount the passengers’ perspective. An application on a real regional line in Campania (Italy) showsthe benefits of the proposed approach for performing off-line analyses of intervention solutions andhelping dispatchers make decisions during critical events to increase service quality.