Power Supply for a Railway Line Running Trains at Very High Frequency: Investigation Using a Simplified Model

It is commonly assumed that operating trains at very high frequencies requires a substantial increase in the capacity of electric traction power supply systems, particularly to deal with surge in power demand caused by service disruptions. However, this assumption may not hold under “synchronisation control” which automatically minimises headway between consecutive trains on a railway controlled by pure moving block (PMB) while maintaining PMB's safety constraints. In this study, we tested this hypothesis through simulations using a simplified model under two different scenarios. In the first scenario, nine passing trains followed one departing train at a station with the shortest possible headways. A severe delay in the departure of the leading train resulted in a peak power demand slightly less than twice that of a single accelerating train. In the second scenario, 15 trains operated according to two different timetables on a circular 15-station railway line. In this case, the impact of departure delays on peak power demand was difficult to identify. These results support the validity of our hypothesis.