The RESTRAIL research project was disseminated at the TRA 2014 conference through the presentation of two papers and the organisation of one Invited Session. Both papers were presented on 17 April 2014, during the Human Factors and Safety session. This was one of the Scientific and Technical sessions scheduled on the last day of the conference.
The paper entitled “RESTRAIL: Collaborative project on REduction of Suicides and Trespasses on RAILway property” (Bonneau, Colliard, & Havarneanu) was presented in 15 minutes to an audience of approximately 30 persons by Grigore Havarneanu (UIC). This paper aimed to inform the scientific community about the results of the completed work: data analysis on railway suicide and trespass, assessment of preventative and mitigation measures, and the development of a toolbox of best practice. These achievements were presented in relation to the ongoing activities of the project: a set of 11 field tests which evaluate some of the promising measures in order to bring more evidence and recommendations concerning their effectiveness.
A second paper was entitled “A model of suicide and trespassing processes to support the analysis and decision related to preventing railway suicides and trespassing accidents at railways” (Burkhardt, Rådbo, Silla, & Paran). It was displayed as a poster which described and justified such a theoretical model from a review of more than 140 papers on rail suicide and/or trespass. The model identifies nine steps and antecedents in the chain of events leading to railway suicides and trespassing accidents, and associates them with corresponding classes of preventative measures. The added-value of this model, as well as other important considerations, were provided during the poster session by Jean-Marie Burkhardt (IFSTTAR-LPC) and Anne Silla (VTT).
In the afternoon, a two-hour Invited Session was organised for the potential end-users of the RESTRAIL outcome: “A new tool for the prevention and mitigation of railway suicides and trespass”. The aim of the session was to evaluate and discuss the RESTRAIL toolbox in the context of a wider workshop about risk analysis and decision making related to the prevention of railway suicide and trespassing. The discussion covered the risk analysis process, possible tools for decision-making as well as international lessons learned from best practices in different countries. The discussion was based on a case study. It provided a good opportunity to apply the tool, to assess the usefulness and usability and to discuss the possibilities of improvement in the future.
The final RESTRAIL event will be hosted by UIC on 18 September 2014.
