Improved fuzzy decision support system for human-realistic overtaking in railway traffic simulations

Abstract

In a simulation model of a railway system it is a necessity, to have realistic train overtaking behavior during disturbances. Many simulation tools address this problem by using simple overtaking solutions, such as look ahead. These tend to be non-intuitive to configure and often not very human-realistic. The goal of this paper is to design a fuzzy system that can easily be used to simulate human-realistic overtaking behavior. A fuzzy system has been chosen because this approach is well-suited for human-style decision making. The presented fuzzy system considers timetables, train positions, delays, buffer times etc. as inputs and provides instructions to the simulation tool whether given train should or should not be overtaken. Finally the performance of the system is evaluated by a case study simulating a part of the railway system in the Czech Republic around the town of Pardubice.