Railway Infrastructure Capacity Evaluation of Modular Rail Pods under ETCS Level 2 Signalling System

Rail Pods are an emerging concept of modular self-propelled rail vehicle which can interchangeably move freight and transport for a more customer-oriented rail service. Pods are envisaged to operate on-demand with the possibility of forming platoons by either physically or virtually coupling at stations. In such a context, it is essential to quantify the actual service capacity of rail pod platooning, taking into account heterogeneous convoy structures and infrastructure constraints such as signalling rules and block occupation. This study extends UIC Code 406/blocking time theory to applied to Pod platoons, proposing a novel optimization model that integrates traction, cruising, and braking speed profiles alongside safe separation constraints. This approach enables coordinated optimization of cruising speeds across various platoon structures to minimize track capacity consumption. The model is applied to a case study considering the ETCS Level 2 signalling system. The results obtained for such a case study illustrate the ability of the proposed model to identify operational speed and composition of rail pods’ platoons which lead to capacity effective use of the existing infrastructure. The proposed method provides potentials for a more flexible allocation of modular rail cars based on demand configuration.