Alternative forms of operation for the Appenzellers Rack railways

Customer: INFRAS, Switzerland

End customer: Canton of Appenzell A.Rh. and St. Gallen

Project tasks

• Actual state analysis and screening of the available information including inspection of the three railway lines
• Description of the state of the art in the market
• Investigation of Automation possibilities
• Development of a cost and benefit analysis
• Creation of a final report including evaluation and recommendation for all three railway

Our Approach

As a first step a state analysis and screening of the available information including inspection of the three railway lines was carried out. Then a target system architecture was described using state of the art available technology. Various automation possibilities were developed and assessed. On top a cost and benefit analysis was carried out. All findings were collected in the final report including evaluation and recommendation for all three railways.

Customer benefit

Thanks to PROSE’s structured approach INFRAS received a well-founded result from a broad diversified analysis of the technical possibilities and economic effects of automation of the railway operation of the three lines. During the project the client received an overview of the possibilities as well as of the current state of the art on the subject of automated and autonomous driving operation. PROSE therefore develops a concrete recommendation and the magnitude of the necessary investments in the introduction of automated railway operations.