Järnvägen Halmstad och Nässjö - en resurs för befolkning och näringsliv

The purpose of this study is to show which possibilities the railways in the western part of Småland can offer to the inhabitants and industry within the region. The background is that the passenger traffic is suffering from unprofitability because of bad infrastructure standard, long journey times and low traffic density. The railway between Halmstad and Nässjö was completed 1882, and the branch line to Jönköping was completed 1892. Further branch lines was built to the main line, and the establishement of these railways contributed to an industrial developement within the region. After 1950 the increased usage of passenger cars and lorries caused lower travelling with trains. This caused closures of branch lines with lower traffic and rationalization along the main line. After a couple of political decisions the Swedish State Railways monopoly whas lightened and other operators was permitted to run passenger traffic. Because of this a cooperation started between the counties which the railway streched through to enable passenger traffic between the counties. Already 2006 a debate started about closing a part of the railway. The Swedish railway administration considered that the subsidies from the goverment wasn’t enough for the maintenance of these railways. It is therefore very interesting to perform this study since the future of these railways is unsure! An account of the starting point shows a large variation concerning the size of the surrounding populations. The changes is often stabile or negative apart from the county towns, where the population is growing. The commute into the places in the region is often greater than the commute outwards along with a large gainful employment. This involves a good labour market. The industry consists in most cases of production industry with low refining values, which causes considerable transport needs to for example the paper mill Stora Enso in Hyltebruk and the steel ribbon producer Burseryds bruk. Both county towns are also important logistic centras with excellent aviability to transport infrastructure. The developement of the passenger travelling was stabile until 2002, when the passenger traffic between Växjö and Jönköping increased. This resulted also in increased travelling. The railway infrastructure is to a greate extent obsolete with older track constructions which results in long journey times and low traffic density. An analysis of deficiency shows that the obsolete and worn railway infrastructure results in a track with decreased safety and increased risk for derailments. This can also result in a non passable track. This kind of infrastructure also results in lower comfort for the passangers. It also admit higher costs for maintance because of many maintance routines. The worn of the track components also increases. The manual traffic management is personal demanding and expensive. Worn of important track components like points and signal systems causes interference within the traffic system. This causes a large amount of delayments. Within the studied period of about a year the total quantity of delayments was about 33,6 hours. To summarize, the total amount of deficiency within the railway infrastructure with for example obsolete and worn track components and interference within the traffic is causing problems. The train becomes a less attractive means of transport, which also is caused by long journey times and low traffic density. This limits the possibility for the inhabitants within the region to commute to adjacent labour markets, schools and universities. The daily traffic system give rise to many changes between other trains or buses which also is too long. This decreases the attractiveness of rail travelling. The attractiveness is also decreasing because of poor information about travelling prices from the operators. An analysis of interests for example counties, municipalities and industry shows that there are a great interest of developing the rail traffic along the studied railways. Decreased journey times and increased traffic density is desired. It is considered that there are a large developement potential of moving goods från road transport to rail transport with the developement and construction of combi terminals. Increased railway transports of goods also contributes to a better enviroment. To solve the deficiencies that exists and give better transport possibilities it is necessary to invest in the studied railways. The track must be renewed to a welded track on concrete sleepers and the signal system must be modernized. De new railway infrastructure must also be maintained trough preventative maintainance. Velocity and capacity studies resulted in three alternatives of modernisation. The first alternative involves a light modernisation with a decreased journey time of 14 minutes. The traffic density was also increased to departures every second hour. The second alternative involves a modernisation which enable a velocity of maximal 140 km/h with a decreased journey time of 37 minutes. The traffic density was also increased to departures every second hour with two more trains in both directions morning and afternoon. The third alternative involves a modernisation which enable a velocity of maximal 160 km/h with a decreased journey time of 45 minutes. The traffic density is similar to the second alternative. The first and the second alternative results in investment costs of 400-500 Mkr. The third alternative is considerable more expensive with investment cost of 1,2 Mdr. The increased traffic density and the decreased journey times gives possibilities to make railway traffic more attractive as a mean of traffic for passenger and goods. This also gives the possibilities to move goods from road to rail transport. In a long term perspective these improvements gives a more durable transport supply with decreased environment influence. It also decreases the strain of other transport infrastructure like roads for example. De improvements also gives positive effects for the development within the region like region enlargements. Keywords: Railway traffic, railway, railroad traffic, railroad, infrastructure, transport, industry, management and maintainanc