of players 1

**5.3 Railway bridge game** 

One of the two strategic innovation trajectories to come to the desired capacity increase is the program to come to a metro-like timetable on the major corridors. On the Amsterdam – Eindhoven corridor this program is titled 'Every Ten Minutes A Train' (Elke Tien Minuten Een Trein – in Dutch), shortly ETMET. In the fall of 2010, the largest train operator National Railways (NS) and ProRail tested this concept for a full month in the real operation. This program required substantial preparation, and gaming simulation was selected through the senior staff involved in earlier games to answer questions about two ways of handling a major disruption under the new timetable. This resulted in the ETMET 2010 Game, described in Table 4.

In the ETMET 2010 Game we simulated the train flow and all processes and interactions in the train control, personnel and rolling stock processes. The wish was to have the train traffic controllers working on gaming modules similar to the one in the Railway Bridge Game. Soon during the development we found out that the underlying rail traffic simulators available did not support the required actions of turning around, skipping a service or renumbering rolling stock to different train services. Therefore the decision was made to create a complete manual, analog simulator, observed with cameras overhead the infrastructure maps, distributing views similar to the regular computer visualizations to three rooms with operators.

The session delivered the data required to answer the question on the differences between two methods of handling a major disruption. The project management assumed the new method to be beneficial for resilience, however they proved wrong. The new method essentially provided a pre-defined pattern for guiding trains over a double track where one track is blocked. The network and service controller had to makes their choices out of the set of trains currently running on the tracks, approaching the blocked track. Remaining trains have to be cancelled or coupled. This was assumed to be a better solution than the old solution in which there is a separate document for every possible interaction between two trains. It appeared however, that the choices for assigning trains to the pattern were impossible to make, given the interactions that all the trains available have with other parts of the system. While working on a solution the situation changed too fast to make a single decision in time, while overseeing all of the complexity.

Gaming Simulations for Railways:

Lessons Learned from Modeling Six Games for the Dutch Infrastructure Management 287

that the risk of flooding and even completely crashing the traffic flow is high. Resilience and robustness of the Dutch rail network therefore has to consider Utrecht as a key parameter. In previous years the timetable has been 'disentangled', meaning that trains are assigned to a corridor and that these corridors are planned to have as little interference with each other on the physical infrastructure as possible. Now, after ProRail disentangled the schedule the aim is to reduce the interference further by matching the control concept to the corridors.

Gaming simulation has been selected as a tool to try out the concept first in a simulated environment before it will be brought to the control post. During the game the effect of the new concept on goals 1,4 and 5 had to be researched. Table 5 describes the game details.

The main result of the NAU game was empirically based insight in the fundamental consequences of reducing the number of switches used and corridor control on capacity, resilience and robustness. In the old situation, the capacity reduces rapidly as the disturbance level increases. Due to the many switches, many options remain in heavily disturbed situations to continue driving, requiring a mastery level of the train controller. These options cause 'infection' of problems of one corridor to others. When using corridor control in its strict sense, the process remains more manageable with mild to moderate disturbances. But because the control options are limited to the corridors, there comes a moment in the corridor that all capacity is lost, still not affecting the other corridors. There's a tipping point where the limits for a disturbed corridor become unacceptably high. At this tipping point it can help to deviate from the corridor principle. The ideal situation is to control & isolate the corridor as long as possible and use other parts of the infrastructure only when the critical level of disturbance is reached. In other words: you want to cash the potential of corridor control and avoid potential losses. Where the disturbance level is critical, how often this situation occurs and what specific deviations must be allowed, is still

In the NAU game modeling we re-used the infrastructure schematic layout and timetabling information that was so successful in the ETMET game. Yet again this proved to immerse the participants in the simulation within a few minutes, and to make them enact their role perfectly. In this post-game evaluation the participants rated their behavior as highly realistic. The only exceptions to this were the network and service controller who both work at the national level. For them there was no game material to play with apart from information derived from the simulated area. This resulted in less emersion and a bit grumpy atmosphere in which they were mocking about the new concept. For the project this proved functional as their comments in the discussion raised important points for the improvement of the concept, but the game play from them was not optimal. Therefore no direct conclusions could be drawn

For this the NAU (New Action plan Utrecht) program was launched.

Within the NAU program five goals have been identified: 1. ensure that the basic plan remains within the corridors; 2. limiting defects through maintenance / inspection;

5. adjust the division of labor in the Traffic Control Post.

from the interaction between the national and regional level.

3. Limiting deviations from shunting; 4. limit abnormalities in major disruptions;

open for further research.


Table 4. Core description of ETMET 2010 Game

In this game all data was completely detailed available to all participants, on paper, and mostly in a format they recognize, using all real-world abbreviations and notations. Contrary to many games in which the designer abstracts and reduces to a level where it is not about managing large amounts of data, it proves to be very well possible to give operators this data. It even helps to give them situation awareness, as in the debriefing all were confident that their behavior and reactions were similar to what they would to in practice, and all could work with the data supplied.

### **5.5 NAU**

Utrecht Central station is the heart of the Dutch rail network: here come trains from all directions together in a versatile, but consequently complex knot. The complexity and interdependence of the many train movements and other activities makes Utrecht very vulnerable to chain reactions of delays. For large disturbances, history has repeatedly shown that the risk of flooding and even completely crashing the traffic flow is high. Resilience and robustness of the Dutch rail network therefore has to consider Utrecht as a key parameter.

In previous years the timetable has been 'disentangled', meaning that trains are assigned to a corridor and that these corridors are planned to have as little interference with each other on the physical infrastructure as possible. Now, after ProRail disentangled the schedule the aim is to reduce the interference further by matching the control concept to the corridors. For this the NAU (New Action plan Utrecht) program was launched.

Within the NAU program five goals have been identified:


286 Infrastructure Design, Signalling and Security in Railway

Purpose Testing the differences between two mechanisms of handling

Roles Train traffic controllers, Passenger information, Driver

controller, Service controller. # of players 14 in role, 9 in support roles in analog simulator center, 6 observers, 1 host, 1 game leader Own/real/fictitious role Own roles, invited on personal title however with support of

Scenarios 2 scenarios: first the 'old' way and then a new mechanism Intervention range Facilitators could start, stop and pause the scenarios.

Simulated world Detailed infrastructure Utrecht - Geldermalsen, detailed high-

Immersion Full immersion in a few minutes. Conflicts arose, leading to a

Data presentation Infrastructure representation in familiar schematics, detailed

differences between 2 mechanisms. Consequences Proposed solution abandoned based on data generated in the

In this game all data was completely detailed available to all participants, on paper, and mostly in a format they recognize, using all real-world abbreviations and notations. Contrary to many games in which the designer abstracts and reduces to a level where it is not about managing large amounts of data, it proves to be very well possible to give operators this data. It even helps to give them situation awareness, as in the debriefing all were confident that their behavior and reactions were similar to what they would to in

Utrecht Central station is the heart of the Dutch rail network: here come trains from all directions together in a versatile, but consequently complex knot. The complexity and interdependence of the many train movements and other activities makes Utrecht very vulnerable to chain reactions of delays. For large disturbances, history has repeatedly shown

Type of data generated Quantitative and qualitative, testing hypotheses about

scheduling

management.

play.

interfaces.

gaming session.

Time model Continuous
