Author(s)

G. Cosulich, A. Derito, M. Giannettoni & S. Savio

Abstract

The objectives of the EU project Rail Car Asset Management (hereinafter referred to with its short name, F-MAN) were to investigate the feasibility, the potential impacts and benefits of a new approach toward the management of a freight railcars fleet, aiming at improving the competitiveness of Railway Cargo Operators in the context of freight transport. To reach its objectives, the F-MAN Consortium has identified the requirements, designed the architecture, specified and developed the components (on-board and ground fixed) of an IT-based system enabling enhanced fleet management of freight railcars and introducing asset management in the process of the international transport chain. In the paper the authors show the quantitative results of the final assessment of the project, describing also the characteristics of the simulation tool to this aim developed. Keywords: railway, cargo fleet management, IT-based system, simulation. 1 Introduction The F-MAN project started in October 2001 from a consortium bringing together the experience, expertise, know-how and knowledge of an heterogeneous set of partners including Railway Cargo Operators (RCOs), developers of Transport and Logistics applications, Information & Communication Technologies experts and Research Institutions [1, 2]. The project was co-funded by the European Community under the Information Society Technologies (IST) Programme and provided its final results in September 2004. The F-MAN system is made of three main modules, namely the Tracking System Module (TSM), the Data Processing Module (DPM) and the Asset Management Module (AMM). The TSM is constituted by On-Board Terminals

Keywords

railway, cargo fleet management, IT-based system, simulation.