Risk analysis for ensure the safety of railway tracks

Considering the railway investments in Turkey, it is expected that there will be a significant increase in railway transportation in the near future. Train speeds will increase in parallel with amount of train traffic and improvement of train technology. There will be serious risks on railway safety because of increased train traffic and high speeds trains. Train traffic and high speeds will accelerate the deterioration of the railway tracks increasing the number of maintenance and renewal works. These maintenance and renewal activities will cause the railway operation to be interrupted even more close the railway line for operation. In order to increase the efficiency and competitive capacity of railway operation, the maintenance and renewal works will become inevitable while the railways in operation. During the maintenance and renewal works under the railway traffic, it will become even more important to take the necessary precautions and to carry out risk analyses of railway track work site safety in order to ensure the safety of operation and workers. For this purpose, the European Union has developed and implemented the standards EN 50126 and EN 16704. EN 50126 provide guidance on RAMS (Reliability, Availability, Maintainability and Safety) for rail industry. EN 16704 is about requirements and measures including the significant and specific railway risks during maintanance and renewal works on or in proximity of the railway tracks. This standart also includes common principles for the protection of fixed and mobile work sites with trains and/or machines circulating on the working track and trains circulating on the adjacent track. In this study, a comprehensive literature surway was realized, the RAMS concepts were summarised and finally a case study for TCDD was done on railway worksite safety analyses by using quantitative risk calculation methods on the base of EN 50126 and EN 16704 standards.