The growing preference toward greener commuting, as well as the steady increase of people and businesses relocating to America’s cities, means passenger rail operators are dealing with a growing ridership and higher expectations. As demand increases so does the effort to make operations safer, with tighter regulations around employees, infrastructure, and equipment.
The Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) plays a key role in improving safety of the country’s numerous passenger rail operators. In addition to new regulations around positive train control, the FRA also places restrictions on covered service for positions such as engineers and conductors, to reduce the risks associated with fatigue. However, this vital commitment to safety in rail operations places a burden on rail planners who are often hampered by inadequate and antiquated planning systems that can’t cope with the many constraints.
The risks for US passenger rail operators
Violating hours of service regulations not only potentially jeopardizes the safety of passengers and crew members, it can also result in substantial fines from the FRA that can range from hundreds to thousands of dollars. Each day that a violation continues constitutes a separate offense, meaning that these fines can stack up quickly. Violations subject rail operators to audits and investigations, placing an administrative burden on top of the financial costs.
Furthermore, dispatchers and planners can spend a significant amount of time simply trying to find and correct these issues, if their systems are not helpful enough.
Rail operators and planners must be able to foresee future labor rule conflicts when planning their crew, see a visual representation of where they will occur, and create plans that not only follow the rules but make optimal use of their staff in servicing timetables.
But is this just a pipe dream for rail operators or a realistic possibility?
The complex planning environment of rail crew planning
Foreseeing potential conflicts in crew plans begins with the accurate modeling of all of the rules and constraints that must be followed when constructing a crew diagram or roster. Not only do FRA regulations need to be taken into consideration when planning, but a wide range of other rules and restrictions need to be accounted for.
For instance, 12 hours of covered service is the maximum shift allowed by the FRA before fines begin to accumulate. While rail operators often override these limits in times of emergency, the costs and administrative burden of violations make it imperative for rail planners to be aware of these issues and prevent them before they occur.
The following table helps illustrate just some of the complex requirements rail planners must build into their plans:
Collective bargaining agreements impose further rules and restrictions that must be followed as well. Likewise, overtime hours need to be judiciously managed to meet operating and service objectives while controlling overall labor costs. Incorporating all of these rules and regulations is a complex process, as most rail planning systems are inflexible difficult to change.
With a rules-based model in place in rail planning systems, visualizing conflict areas and resolving them is far less daunting. Visualizing is best done starting at the macro level, with a system that can show the number of potential labor violations in a plan, and direct users to the violations to re-plan accordingly.
These and other detailed alerts help planners and dispatchers find and use a solution that both solves the problem and best achieves the company’s KPIs.
The future of rail crew planning
Is it sufficient to have all of the rules modeled, and to have good communication when those rules are broken? Ideally, advanced planning should create crew plans ahead of time, which not only follow the FRA regulations and labor rules, but also drive the plan towards maximizing KPIs for service levels and profitability. With so many rules and KPIs that will vary from organization to organization, optimization technology must be just as powerful and flexible as the rules definitions and visualizations themselves.
Fortunately for today’s planners, modern planning platforms do exist. These systems provide the basis for passenger rail planners to create excellent, optimized plans and drive business goals forward. Optimization is not only about improving business results – with hours of service rules incorporated into the plan, rail operators’ highly-trained personnel are better satisfied with their schedules and operating under safer condition. Planners can also discover new opportunities in their networks, and continue to serve the customers and the crew that depend on them.
What opportunities exist in your organization to work within the rules while finding opportunities to maximize? I look forward to hearing your thoughts.
Looking to discuss how dispatchers can fix crew violations before they occur? Join our upcoming webinar and learn how to balance crew and passenger safety with high standards of service and on-time performance.
