Abstract

International audience; The growing increase in the volume of transportation system’s flows has entailed congestion problems of traffic. For railway transport as well as other transportation networks, the increase in traffic demand—without further investing in infrastructure—stands as a chief priority for operators. As a matter of fact they take special interest in improving the operating possibilities for some critical points of the rail network. In order to resolve the problems inherent in the operational management of rail transport traffic, optimization experts have operated mathematical optimization techniques and problem resolving methods that have been developed as part of operational research aimed at keeping a good level of availability. However, these optimization approaches have considerably contributed to balancing and stabilizing the flows of road and rail networks but still do not guarantee security at system, environmental and human levels. This work introduces a management and regulatory approach to rail traffic and takes into account the security component while chiefly aiming at improving and keeping a “good” level of security. To this end, we have set up a security modelling approach based on a hybrid risk analysis, both quantitative and qualitative. This approach seeks to develop a structured framework allowing the integration of the security component into an explicit generic optimization model in accordance with the operating constraints in use by rail optimization methods. On the one hand, this approach constitutes a formal checking process for the management and optimization of traffic even though they are subject to failures. On the other, it is a set of modelling tools and a methodological structure allowing managing and controlling risks at the level of a rail transport system.