Climate Change Impact Assessment on Railway Maintenance

Modern societies have become more and more complex, interconnected, and heavily dependent ontransport infrastructure. Moreover, most transport infrastructures were conceptualized, designed and built withoutanticipating the future variations of climate change. Climate changes have a negative impact on the railway systemand related costs. Increased temperatures, precipitation, sea levels, and frequency of extremely adverse weatherevents such as floods, heatwaves, and heavy snowfall pose major risks and consequences for railway infrastructureassets, operations and maintenance. Approximately, 5 to 10% of total failures and 60% of delays of trains are dueto various climate change impacts of railway infrastructure in northern Europe. In Sweden, weather-related failureswere responsible for 50% of train delays in switches and crossings (S&C).The paper explores a pathway toward climate resilience in transport networks and assess the climate change impactson railway infrastructure by integrating transport infrastructure health information with meteorological, satellite,and expert knowledge. The paper provides recommendations considering adaptation options to ensure an effectiveand efficient railway transport operation and maintenance.ISBN for host publication: 978-981-18-5183-4Robust infrastructure – Adapting railway maintenance to climate change (CliMaint