Design of a robust railway line system for severe winter conditions in The Netherlands

Winter weather has a major impact on railway operations in The Netherlands. To stay in control, the number of trains is reduced by half in a special “winter timetable”. This results in a more robust network, but an insufficient amount of transport capacity. Adapting the line system can result in more transport capacity without losing robustness. This paper therefore focuses on the performance of a line system under extreme weather conditions. We define several criteria to assess the performance of the line system in terms of robustness and transport capacity. A case study has been conducted on the railway network in The Netherlands, which indicates that all alternatives are more robust and yield more transport capacity than the current winter timetable.