The Ongoing Information versus Data

Challenge
Engineering

Track Maintenance Planning in the Era of Big Data

David Staplin – Deputy Chief Engineer Track
December 9, 2014

Safe Reliable Economical Smart

 Information versus Data
Engineering

Where have we come from – case study

The evolution of “data”

Where we are now

Where we want to go

Safe Reliable Economical Smart

 Where We Have Come From
Engineering

Formation of Conrail in 1976

United States Railway Association had detailed inventory of
infrastructure condition
–Massive study including walking samples over entire network
–Data in boxes summarized to “operating segment” level

Final size and funding based on network sized by cost of

ongoing rehabilitation and maintenance (data was manual)

Challenge: Put the money where it did the most good first
–35,000 miles of track
–7,800 miles of track under slow orders, many down to 15 MPH
–Check the YouTube Penn Central Trustee’s video for your own
edification

Safe Reliable Economical Smart

 Where We Have Come From
Engineering

Conrail Board challenged to use Fed funding wisely

No formal methodology existed for evaluating
maintenance projects based on business case
–Improve operation of trains on network
–Improve safety
Cut costs
–Cut
–Focus on profitability

Rail lines

Lines of business

–Strategic importance

Conrail developed operations planning group and hired

consultant to develop a methodology

Board gave the group three months to do the impossible
Safe Reliable Economical Smart
 Where We Have Come From
Engineering

Methodology developed combined

–Business techniques
–Expert knowledge
–Expert opinion

All of the above required massive amounts of data that

did not exist in an organized repository

Where then to get it? Relied on:
–Field operating and maintenance personnel to develop business
case data (scope, budget, improvement to be expected)
–Marketing to provide relative profitability
–Senior management for strategic guidance

Safe Reliable Economical Smart

 Where We Have Come From
Engineering

Each project took a minimum of three pages of

handwritten data

Data was transferred to key punch cards for input
–1545 projects input
–1238 chosen

Even with crude data, total selected program

–Cost 4% less
–Yielded 31% more benefits

The case for data driven decisions was made but

–Where to get quality data
–Where to get consistent data
–How to get data that did not burden staff and field forces

Safe Reliable Economical Smart

 Where We Have Come From
Engineering

Safe Reliable Economical Smart

 The Evolution of Data
Engineering

In the beginning data and information were often

synonymous
–Data was generally about failure

Failure could be verified by

-Measurement (geometry car)

-Testing (internal rail flaw detection)
-Eyesight (mud spot)
–Issue was more about where to go first with resources not whether
there was a need to do something or when
–As things continued to “break,” they got added to the job jar

The railway network had enough capacity to absorb any

shortcomings if the crude selection processes were
sometimes non-optimal

Safe Reliable Economical Smart

 The Evolution of Data
Engineering

As the railway network improved, the choices for expending

resources began to get more difficult
–Better data was needed
–More data was needed

Example in rail replacement strategies…

While jointed rail was still common, one needed to know where it was
–While
–Once main tracks were predominantly welded

Needed defect information, by type (rail defect data bases)

Accumulated usage (tonnage from train movement records)

Wear data and trends (rail wear camera systems)

Surface condition (corrugation analyzers)

Collection and storage systems were able to keep up with

more discrete data
Safe Reliable Economical Smart
 The Evolution of Data
Engineering

Track Geometry
Joint inspection

Lidar for ROW
Rail
–Type and chemistry

GPR for ballast and
–Defect
subgrade
–Wear

GPS to locate anything –B-scan history of interior
–Surface analysis

Ties & fasteners
–Line scan data
Right-of-way sensors
–Lidar –HBD
–WILD

Accelerometers –Wheel profile
Safe Reliable Economical Smart
 Where We Are Now
Engineering

Industry has seen steady growth since last round of big

mergers in the 1990s (Conrail break-up)

Industry has the ability to move into markets quickly (oil)

Industry is safer than ever (hold that thought)

Network has seen signs of strain (Amtrak OTP mirrors it)
–Started before 2008 recession)
–Has recently shown signs of returning

Nodes - Chicago

Links – Empire Builder route east of Minot

Safe Reliable Economical Smart

 Where We Are Now
Engineering

What happens when network strains

–At the node or link where strain occurs, capacity is consumed,
stopping growth
–Reliability drops, impacting other nodes and links
–Train crews outlaw on the road
–Maintenance crews are inhibited from inspection and repair
–Costs go up as efficiency drops
–Customers complain
–Amtrak cannot maintain schedules
–Some business is driven off
–Recovery from service interruptions takes longer

The network of the future may have to operate

substantially better to accommodate growth

Safe Reliable Economical Smart

 Where We Are Now
Engineering

Safe Reliable Economical Smart

 Where We Want to Go
Engineering

Congratulations, derailments per mtm decreased annually

at an average rate of 3.1%

Plan is to cut rate by another 60% by 2030, a
compounded reduction rate of 2.5%

But…
–What if traffic grows 2.5%? The number of derailments doesn’t
change
–What if traffic grows 3.5%? The number of derailments will go up

Can the rail network live with that?

Will the public live with that?

We might need to do better

–What if we had to reduce events 3.5% per year?

Safe Reliable Economical Smart

 Where We Want to Go
Engineering

In thinking of how we can do better in the future…

–Much low hanging fruit has already been picked (burnt off journals)
–Some of the known problems have been tough to crack (DFs)
–We don’t know what new problems we might face

History shows that solving one problem often exposes another

Our regulator is not always predictable

We can be certain that we will need:

–More data
–Better data
–To be better at relating disparate data sets

For better alignment of events (RCF)

For determining relationships leading to cause and effect

Safe Reliable Economical Smart

 Where We Want to Go
Engineering

More data – Rail defects

–Reliably assessing cracks that have potential to become TDDs
–Seeing defects in the web and base of rail
–Seeing defects in thermite welds

Better data – Assessment of force free temp in rail

Example - Amtrak project with VT on high frequency

accelerometers to “listen” to the track

Safe Reliable Economical Smart

 Where We Want to Go
Engineering

At the end of the day, based on past history, we can be

confident of having more and better data

Going forward, our largest single challenge:
How can we take the data we have, the new data we get, and
be able to:

1. “Cross talk” among the technologies

2. Search for trends and relationships hidden in the data
3. Analyze data in context

The complexity and amount are such that data by itself no

longer guarantees that we have INFORMATION

Safe Reliable Economical Smart