In-station train dispatching is the problem of optimising the effective utilisation of available railway infrastructures for mitigating incidents and delays. This is a fundamental problem for the whole railway network efficiency, and in turn for the transportation of goods and passengers, given that stations are among the most critical points in networks since a high number of interconnections of trains’ routes holds therein. Despite such importance, nowadays in-station train dispatching is mainly managed manually by human operators. In this paper we present a framework for solving in-station train dispatching problems, to support human operators in dealing with such task. We employ automated planning languages and tools for solving the task: PDDL+ for the specification of the problem, and the ENHSP planning engine, enhanced by domain-specific techniques, for solving the problem. We carry out a in-depth analysis using real data of a station of the North West of Italy, that shows the effectiveness of our approach and the contribution that domain-specific techniques may have in efficiently solving the various instances of the problem. Finally, we also present a visualisation tool for graphically inspecting the generated plans.

An Efficient Hybrid Planning Framework for In-Station Train Dispatching

Maratea M.;
2021-01-01

Abstract

In-station train dispatching is the problem of optimising the effective utilisation of available railway infrastructures for mitigating incidents and delays. This is a fundamental problem for the whole railway network efficiency, and in turn for the transportation of goods and passengers, given that stations are among the most critical points in networks since a high number of interconnections of trains’ routes holds therein. Despite such importance, nowadays in-station train dispatching is mainly managed manually by human operators. In this paper we present a framework for solving in-station train dispatching problems, to support human operators in dealing with such task. We employ automated planning languages and tools for solving the task: PDDL+ for the specification of the problem, and the ENHSP planning engine, enhanced by domain-specific techniques, for solving the problem. We carry out a in-depth analysis using real data of a station of the North West of Italy, that shows the effectiveness of our approach and the contribution that domain-specific techniques may have in efficiently solving the various instances of the problem. Finally, we also present a visualisation tool for graphically inspecting the generated plans.
2021
978-3-030-77960-3
Automated planning
In-station train dispatching
PDDL+
Railway station
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11770/356182
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