Below are the first 10 and last 10 pages of uncorrected machine-read text (when available) of this chapter, followed by the top 30 algorithmically extracted key phrases from the chapter as a whole.
Intended to provide our own search engines and external engines with highly rich, chapter-representative searchable text on the opening pages of each chapter.
Because it is UNCORRECTED material, please consider the following text as a useful but insufficient proxy for the authoritative book pages.
Do not use for reproduction, copying, pasting, or reading; exclusively for search engines.
OCR for page 1
SUMMARY
Shared Use of Railroad
Infrastructure with Noncompliant
Public Transit Rail Vehicles:
A Practitioner's Guide
Research Objective
A. Over the past decade, highway and urban congestion have garnered the attention of com-
muters as well as government entities. Facility joint-use, by expanding public transit using
existing rail corridors, is one approach to solving the constellation of problems occurring
as offshoots of congestion. Such routes are especially attractive because they appear to have
available capacity and utilize an existing connection between high trip generating origins
and destinations. The potential and feasibility of shared use of rail corridors, between light
rail vehicles (associated with public transit) and freight railroads, to function compatibly
are still being investigated, even as current "near shared-track" operations are evolving.
B. A number of operating issues need to be addressed, including the relative safety of shared-
track, and practicality of the operational concept. Other questions that remain to be
answered include:
· How to mitigate joint use risks? What accommodations are necessary to make com-
mingled shared-track workable in a variety of situations?
· What are the viable business models?
· How would shared use affect a current freight carrier and the rail corridor operations?
Can track sharing be made attractive to the freight operator?
· What are its advantages to the public?
· How do public agencies develop policies and strategies to enable the use of an existing
freight track for public transit?
· What are the capital, maintenance, and insurance costs elements?
· Finally, the most significant unknown is determining what is necessary to satisfy the
FRA to obtain approval for this mode of operation.
C. The intent of the research project is to initiate a pragmatic investigation whose end
product is a guidebook for transportation and other practitioners, and to assist them
in finding answers to the questions raised above. Part of the goal is pedagogic: to pro-
vide a means to expand knowledge and understanding of strategies to ensure safety in
rail transportation. The information and analysis should form a basis for informed dis-
cussion, analysis, and decisions in the environment of shared-track of infrastructure,
including approaches to an assessment of benefits and costs; and demonstrate current
practical processes and applications of different scopes.
D. Valuable and cost-effective projects of opportunity are available in some of the larger
urban and suburban areas in the United States. Consequently, a secondary goal is to for-
malize and standardize an American approach to concurrent shared-track operations.
1
