Station Capacity and Platform Allocation – A Test Case at Linköping Central Station

Sammanfattning: Different paths for trains throughout a railway system are more or less convenient, where intersecting train paths require a safety margin in time between different trains to reduce the risks of accidents. Intersecting train paths are just as much of a challenge on a railway station, especially when multiple trains are entering the station close in time. Some trains might have to wait before entering the station area, which as a result create delays that can affect other trains and passengers. One method of reducing the delay is by allocating trains efficiently to different platforms on the station, which makes it possible for more trains to be at the station at the same time. The purpose of this report was to investigate the effect of different platform allocation strategies in regard to the punctuality of trains, passengers’ convenience, travel time in the system as well as the delay compared to arrival and departure times. Three research questions were formulated to answer to the purpose, which included how a reduction in platforms affect the railway system, how different strategies affect walking time for passengers and whether it was possible to prioritize different train types to different platforms. To investigate how different platform allocation strategies affect the railway system, simulation as a method was used. With simulation, a model could be constructed similar to the real system, which made it possible to perform different experiments quickly without any impact on the real system. Linköping Central Station was chosen as a test case as it was both reasonably large and geographically close for observations. Four experiments were constructed, with four separate platform allocation strategies, all aimed to answer some part of the purpose. Before conducting the experiments, a base scenario was tested that attempted to mimic the current platforming strategy as much as possible and was used to compare the different experiments to. This thesis demonstrates that several different platform allocation strategies are possible to be used in the test case, where a risk of train delays were present when the number of tracks used were decreased. With the help of the experiments, the three research questions and therefore the purpose of the study have been answered.