Agence métropolitaine de transport (AMT), Canada

Commuter Train Operations Simulations

AMT was planning on making two important changes to the commuter train service operating on the Canadian Pacific (CP) rail line. CANARAIL was mandated to evaluate the impacts of these changes. The first change was moving the storage and light maintenance activities of the commuter trains from CP's Glen yard to the Sortin yard and the second was the addition of a new commuter service to Mascouche. CANARAIL used the Railsim software to evaluate the impacts of these two changes. Schedules for different configurations were analysed. Their robustness was evaluated by simulating signalling, track and train incidents. Level crossing closure times were also estimated with Railsim. Based on results of these simulations, recommendations, aimed at improving the robustness of the operation were made regarding schedules, routing to be adopted to reach the new Sortin yard and improvements to signalling and track.