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This report presents a summary of a one-day educational conference on human-centered incident investigation methods for the railroad industry. Fifty-seven participants from the railroads, rail labor, government, and consulting/academia attended the one-day conference, held in Chicago, IL. Mr....
The problem of assuring alertness in railroad locomotive crews is defined. Principles for maintaining alertness are derived from the experimental literature on vigilance and several unresolved questions are explored through three experiments. The findings are summarized in a set of criteria for...
This report presents a theoretical analysis predicting the temperature distribution, thermal deflections, and thermal stresses that may occur in typical steel Maglev guideways under the proposed Orlando FL thermal environment. Transient, finite element heat transfer analyses are used to predict the...
The safety of various magnetically levitated (maglev) trains under development for possible implementation in the United States is of direct concern to the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA). This report is the second in a series of reports addressing the safety of high-speed maglev trains and...
This report presents the results of a systematic review of the safety requirements selected for the German Transrapid electromagnetic (EMS) type maglev system to determine their applicability and completeness with respect to the construction and operation of maglev systems in the United States....
The ride motions of a Maglev system were simulated by performing specific vertical and roll maneuvers in a small executive jet aircraft. After each maneuver the passenger subjects recorded a comfort rating on a 7-point scale from very comfortable to very uncomfortable. The vertical accelerations of...
The Maglev control computer system should be designed to verifiably possess high reliability and safety as well as high availability to make Maglev a dependable and attractive transportation alternative to the public. A Maglev computer system has been designed using a design-for-validation...
A need exists for a new test rig design with advanced sensing technologies that will allow the railroad industry and regulatory agencies to better understand the wheel-rail contact dynamics and mechanics, especially as it pertains to high-speed rail. Both scaled and full-scale designs are being...
This report presents the results of a study to evaluate the aerodynamic (air velocity and pressure) effects of the new high-speed trains on the safety and comfort of people and the impacts on physical facilities in and around Northeast Corridor stations. This report focuses particularly on the...
This final report documents these nine tests. Volume I, Pre-Impact Determination of Vehicle Properties, summarizes the vehicle properties obtained prior to the impact tests. These vehicle properties were used in computer simulation of the impact tests and included weights, pitch moments of inertia...