SELCAT - Safer European Level Crossing Appraisal and Technology
Overview
Background & policy context:
Every year, more than 330 people are killed in more than 1 200 accidents at road-rail level crossings in the European Union. Together with tunnels and specific road black spots, level crossings have been identified as being a particularly weak point in road infrastructure, seriously affecting road safety. In the case of rail transport, level crossings can represent as much as 50% of all fatalities caused by railway operations.
Up to now, the only effective solution appears to involve upgrading level crossing safety systems even though in more than 90% of cases the primary accident cause is inadequate or improper human behaviour rather than any technical, rail-based issue. High safety requirements for level crossing systems required in European railway sector standards create a high cost hurdle which hinders the technological upgrade of existing systems. Railway standards already include a risk based definition of safety, according to which only unacceptable levels of risk must be eliminated by the technical system. Nevertheless, the lack of an approved common safety methodology which would allow the industry to quantify the risk to be reduced still leads to the imposition of the highest safety integrity levels for technical solutions in most European countries.
To date the fact that level crossings are directly involved in only a very small proportion of road accidents has limited the involvement and commitment of the road sector in developing solutions to the problem. It is expected that this project will help improve the level of engagement of road traffic engineers and policy makers throughout the European Union, leading to the identification of better and smarter solutions and investments designed to facilitate their implementation.
Objectives:
The SELCAT Co-ordination Action (Safer European Level Crossing Appraisal and Technology) aimed to contribute to the reduction of level crossing accidents by the:
- collection, analysis and dissemination of existing research results and the stimulation of new knowledge exchange in the area of level crossing safety;
- creation of circumstances whereby European partners, in the rail and road sectors, can make a significant contribution to the reduction of accidents, injuries and fatalities at level crossings;
- understanding and codifying of existing and planned research;
- comparison and harmonisation of data sources;
- xxploration of new technologies and harnessing of appraisal techniques to optimise these.
It was expected that the activities of SELCAT would lead directly to the improvement and expansion of intermodal collaboration between the road and rail sectors.
In accordance with the European Commission's White Paper on European Transport Policy, SELCAT contributed to the investigation of new technologies for improved road and rail safety and to the implementation of the objectives of the Strategic Rail Research Agenda (SRRA) of the European Rail Research Advisory Council (ERRAC) by focusing on the reduction of fatalities, the methodology of common risk assessment and the process of cost benefit analysis.
Addressing safety methods, safety targets and indicators in connection with cost benefit analysis SELCAT also harmonised with the aims of the work programme of the European Railway Agency (ERA). A key objective of SELCAT was to evaluate the safety performance of European level crossings and to make recommendations on the common safety targets for this particular sub-system of railway transport. In addition, as a practical example, the level crossing will be used to provide a benchmark for the application of evaluation methodologies and can be used as an important contribution to the adoption of the Common Safety Methods planned by ERA for implementation in 2008.
In order to reach the above scientific and technological objectives and taking into account the current problems described, SELCAT carried out co-ordination activities to:
- provide a knowledge base for the improvement of level-crossing safety by carrying out an analysis of the results of those safety-related projects included in FP5 and FP6 relevant to Railway and Road Transport;
- provide an overview of existing and planned level crossing res
Methodology:
Co-ordination activities
All the co-ordination activities were focused on the increase of level crossing safety addressing all possible influencing factors.
The first factor was learning from the current 'state of the art' including an overview of the present status of level crossing accidents statistics and the research completed during FP5 and FP6 relevant to the areas of rail and road transport safety (WP1). The second influencing factor was an examination of advanced technologies which could be applied to decrease the number of level crossing accidents (WP2).
The third critical factor is the need to understand how well expenditure on level crossing upgrades is aligned to operational risk evaluation, system safety, performance and cost-benefit analysis overall (WP3). WP3 methodology applied the results of WP1 (level crossing accident statistics) and WP2 (level crossing technical solutions), but could also be applied to the investigation and design of any other safety critical transport control system.
Dissemination activities
This activity involved three workshops to disseminate the results from recent selected FP5 and FP6 projects and promote participation in the FP7. These workshops will underpin the dissemination activities and facilitate networking between participants. Face-to-face meetings of those directly involved in level crossing safety is necessary to create lasting collaboration between people and organisations with different backgrounds.
The creation of the 'Level Crossing Web portal' should result in the broad dissemination of safety and level crossing related research activities investigated by the SELCAT Project.
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