00962142

Component

https://doi.org/10.3141/1825-02

http://scholar.google.com...lman&publication_year=2003

Comparisons are made of the effectiveness of competing crashworthiness strategies--crash energy management (CEM) and conventional passenger train design. CEM is a strategy for providing rail equipment crashworthiness that uses crush zones at the ends of cars. These zones are designed to collapse in a controlled way during a collision, distributing the crush among the train cars. This technique preserves the occupied spaces in the train and limits the decelerations of the occupant volumes. Two scenarios are used to evaluate the effectiveness of the crashworthiness strategies--(a) a train-to-train collision of a cab-car-led passenger train with a standing locomotive-led passenger train and (b) a grade-crossing collision of a cab-car-led passenger train with a standing highway vehicle. The maximum speed for which all the occupants are expected to survive and the predicted increase in fatalities and injuries with increasing collision speed are determined for both train designs. CEM is shown to significantly increase the maximum speed at which all the occupants could survive for both grade crossing and train-to-train collisions for cab-car-led trains, at the expense of modestly increasing the speeds at which occupants impact the interior in train-to-train collisions.

This paper appears in Transportation Research Record No. 1825, Railroad Research: Intercity Passenger Transportation, Track Design and Maintenance, and Hazardous Materials Transport.

English

p. 8-14

2003

Transportation Research Record

0309085586

Figures (10) ; References (25)

Crashes; Crashworthiness; Crushing; Deceleration; Design; Fatalities; Injuries; Occupant dynamics; Passenger cars; Passenger trains; Speed; Strategic planning

Crash energy management; Crush zones; Railroad grade crossing collisions; Train-to-train collisions

Design; Highways; Railroads; Safety and Human Factors; Vehicles and Equipment

TRIS, TRB, ATRI

Aug 21 2003 12:00AM

• DESIGN CALCULATIONS FOR EMBEDDED RAIL IN ASPHALT
• EFFECT OF VERY HIGH-SPEED TRAFFIC ON THE DETERIORATION OF TRACK GEOMETRY
• EXPERIENCE WITH THE PRECAST SPAN METHOD ON THE KOREAN HIGH-SPEED RAIL PROJECT
• HEAVY AXLE LOAD EFFECTS ON FATIGUE LIFE OF STEEL BRIDGES
• INFLUENCE OF TRACK MAINTENANCE ON LATERAL RESISTANCE OF CONCRETE-TIE TRACK
• MULTIVARIATE STATISTICAL MODEL FOR PREDICTING OCCURRENCE AND LOCATION OF BROKEN RAILS
• PRICING COMMUTER, INTERCITY, AND FREIGHT TRAINS IN A TERMINAL RAILWAY CONTEXT: AN APPROACH
• RAILROAD DERAILMENT FACTORS AFFECTING HAZARDOUS MATERIALS TRANSPORTATION RISK