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ABSTRACT This synthesis documents agency practices, innovations, and lessons learned in track maintenance costs. Its purpose is to identify the factors that influence these costs. Foundation information is presented here for transit agency managers, maintenance and operations staffs, and other professionals involved in developing a program for practitioners to actively manage track maintenance costs. The synthesis includes findings from a literature review. It incorporates survey responses from select rail transit agencies, east and west coast, old and new in age. Furthermore, it closely examines organization, practice, and budgeting at three transit agencies in more in-depth case studies to further development of a matrix of factors that influence costs. SUMMARY This synthesis offers survey information, as reported, on agency practices, innovations, and lessons learned in programmed track maintenance costs to identify influences on maintenance costs, such as the following: ⢠Track maintenance activities, listed and defined; ⢠Labor and material costs; ⢠Work windows; ⢠Track inspection and maintenance policies; ⢠Operating characteristics; ⢠Budgeting/accounting practices; ⢠Availability of capital and operating funds; ⢠Recordkeeping procedures; ⢠Etc. This report presents the results of a limited survey and interviews on track maintenance costs, and includes a literature review related to track maintenance costs. 1
The limited survey and interview results indicate that transit agency maintenance is composed of and defined as activities that are conducted on all railroads: rail maintenance, track geometry maintenance, tie and fastener maintenance, ballast maintenance, track inspection, and emergency services (derailment repairs, storm repair, etc.). Survey results show that transit agency track maintenance costs, practices, and policies are primarily influenced by track access; that is, available maintenance windows and site access. The results show that the transitâs track access cost adds to the direct cost of accomplishing a track maintenance task. The survey asked for the direct and indirect costs of three tasks: a 39-ft rail replacement, a switch point replacement, and a frog replacement. Most responding agencies reported work windows of 4 h, of which 50% may be expended traveling to a work site (2 h net work time daily). Vehicle traffic during track maintenance periods (such as testing vehicle repairs, implementing new vehicle and control systems, or dead-heading bad-ordered cars to home yards for repairs) allows single track access during many track maintenance work windows. Track maintenance windows reported were nearly exclusively at night, which adds a measure of difficulty and therefore cost to the track maintenance access issue. Track maintenance access requires an additional level of planning costs, which are not reflected in this survey, to coordinate the work windows to accommodate maintenance crews (structures, stations, traction power, and train control), as well as vehicle testing and shuttling. Limited survey results suggest that the transit agencyâs direct cost (labor and material) to perform a maintenance task is as efficient as or more efficient than that of a freight railroad or contracted service, and that higher track maintenance costs can be attributed almost solely to track access costs. The second largest influence on transit track maintenance cost reported here is unquantifiable: replacement of inappropriate or underperforming component designs installed during original construction. Interviews suggest that maintenance of underperforming track systems is substantial and eventual replacement is costly. Other than underperforming track designs, the survey results report that the primary maintenance cost is from normal wear and fatigue. No agency believes that track damage from other sources such as corrosion, geotechnical issues, derailments, human error, vandalism, or environmental causes has significant adverse influences on track maintenance budgets. The interviews suggest that deferred track maintenance has a cost in the sense that minor, preventive maintenance repairs are supplanted by more costly repairs. However, it is difficult to quantify the cost of deferred maintenance outside of the specific contexts of each case. 2
Based on synthesis survey information, all agencies use a pragmatic approach when budgeting for track maintenance. Funding sources are universally from a variety of public sources, local, state, and federal, with transit funding levels that are subject to tax revenue generation each year. A consistent survey comment appeared to be that maintenance cost-efficiency would be served if uniform annual funding was available. Younger agencies believe their budgets are based on maintenance demand and are reasonably adequate. Older agencies appear to believe that their budgets are inadequate. The differences in these opinions appear to correlate with a 20- to 30-year aging of systems, speculated as the inherent life-cycle benchmark of a system. The pragmatic budgeting of track maintenance balances the longer view of maintenance with the realities of annual budgets. A guiding concept across those offering opinions is to maintain a base level of in-house resources, meaning highly experienced personnel, useful level of appropriate maintenance equipment, and stores of at least emergency materials. The budgeting process therefore attempts to retain experienced personnel and to assess the short- and long-term technical needs of a system. The funding streams apparently require maintenance managers to make overt choices between these necessities on occasion. Although maintenance costs for corrosion repair and other non-wear forms of track degradation are not considered significant, track personnel are aware of the mechanics and possibilities that neglecting those mechanics will result in adverse maintenance. In the past 10 years, rail transit agencies have begun to implement track standards, with at least one agency publishing its track standards for all future new extensions and any retrofit application. In 2002, the APTA Rail Transit Task Force developed a Standard for Transit Track Inspection and Maintenance (RT-S-FS-002-02) to be used in conjunction with the most recent versions of Federal Title 49 CFR 213âTrack Safety Standards (2003) and American Railway Engineering and Maintenance-of- Way Association Manual for Railway Engineering, Volume 1, Chapter 5. The purpose of this standard was to act as a safety guideline; a model for transit to verify that tracks are operated safely and as designed through periodic inspection and maintenance. Individual rail paratransit systems are allowed to modify practices in the standard to accommodate their specific equipment and mode of operation. Track inspection records for safety are publicly available documents, and therefore receive due attention. However, reports on track conditions that are routine maintenance but do not invoke safety standards are treated differently. 3
Some agencies have instituted project cost tracking, creating an objective database for budget estimating and planning. This survey showed that reliable maintenance cost information would be most useful to agency staff as a tool to explain budget proposals, and to document for management as well as funding sources, validity of budget requests. The literature indicates that track maintenance costs are beneficially affected by technology implementation (materials as well as monitoring and detection devices). The economic modeling efforts identified in the literature review conducted during this study did not show any strong links between maintenance costs and the amount of rail traffic. This is likely because the modeling efforts identified used statistical methods relying on general characteristics of the track and vehicles rather than specific rail vehicle characteristics, track characteristics, and local rail traffic characteristics. Models do exist, however, that relate track maintenance cost to the specific characteristics of track, vehicles, and traffic. These models and the results of their specific applications are usually propriety and not available to the public. The survey respondents reflect a limited cross section of young and old agencies from across the United States. This report also contains information on the following topics: ⢠Unit costs (as level of effort) for three common tasks: changing a rail, changing a switch point, and changing a frog. This report focuses on cost factors. The level of efforts provided by agencies show that indirect costs are 50% to 200% of the transit agency maintenance direct (i.e., productive) effort, and these costs are predominately the cost of limited track access. ⢠Unit costs from contract bids as insight on the range of unit costs beyond the few tasks selected above. Although reflecting contractor overheads and, occasionally, bid strategy effects, average bid unit costs have a comparative benchmark value to agency direct effort (without indirect effort), with overheads and profit margins between contractors and agencies approximately equal. ⢠Routine maintenance practices. These practices reflect individual system age, hindering any universal characterization of industry practices. Most agencies practice life-extending methods such as rail grinding and rail lubrication, details varying with system characteristics. ⢠Agency improvements to future maintenance costs, such as implementing track standards and eliminating poorly performing designs and components. 4
⢠Examples of designs that responding agencies reported as challenging: â U-69 guard rail (short life), and Direct Fixation rail clip bolts and anchor bolts (susceptible to loosening and corrosion-freezing). â Welding frogs to running rail. Most agencies have terminated this practice, one agency reluctantly. The reason for mechanically joining frogs to running rail is for expedient replacement. Some agencies use bonded mechanical joints for frog connection to running rail. 5
