Gauging the capability of the British railway network

Abstract

Railway vehicles have traditionally been designed according to gauges that have been demonstrated to provide adequate clearance to the railway infrastructure. The modern railway demands the largest possible vehicles with soft suspension, which are inconsistent with heritage gauges of the last century. More recently, dynamic analyses have allowed larger vehicles to be designed by exploiting the space used for dynamic movement that was poorly used by fixed gauges. However, such analyses have only provided incremental changes to existing designs, as they tended to be focussed on known infrastructure ‘tight spots’. The availability of complete network structure data provided by a ‘National Gauging Project’ allowed a first-principles review of the limiting infrastructure. By using computer simulation to model train characteristics in relation to the infrastructure through which it must pass, it is possible to develop a vehicle of the largest size that can just fit through designated routes. The process, known as a ‘dynamic template’ was applied to routes forming the core British Inter City network, and demonstrated that, contrary to popular belief, it would be viable to design 26 m long rolling stock to operate on these routes.