Understanding the relationship between Railway capacity and performance

近年来，英国客运铁路网络的乘客人数出现了前所未有的增长，在20年的时间里，乘客的公里数翻了一番。由于人口增长、道路拥堵加剧以及对铁路车辆和基础设施的重大投资的影响，预计这种增长模式将持续到未来。更广泛地说，欧盟委员会（European Commission）为客运和货运的增长设定了具有挑战性的目标；他设想，加强竞争是提高质量（进而提高需求）、同时提高效率的一种手段。在这种背景下，英国铁路行业面临的一个关键且相互关联的挑战是管理不断增长的需求（包括客运和货运），同时保持和提高绩效（包括准点率和取消率）。保持繁忙的网络处于良好状态，同时通过提高效率来降低成本，同时管理容量升级，是行业面临的主要挑战。为了应对这一挑战，英国的铁路正在经历前所未有的投资水平，无论是在铁路网络的日常更新方面，还是在旨在提高运力和改善服务的新计划方面，例如通过站台延长、信号和列车控制解决方案、电气化、新的列车车队和新的铁路线。这种背景激发了拟议博士研究的总体目标：使用创新的方法和数据集来调查日益增长的铁路在成本，容量改进和性能方面面临的权衡。重要的是，这项研究将从用户（乘客、货运）的角度出发，同时考虑整体的社会成本和效益（包括企业和政府）。最终，该研究旨在通过解决英国铁路网络如何以最低成本改善服务的数量和质量，平衡短期和长期的问题，从而产生影响。本研究对国际上其他铁路具有推广意义。

Over recent years, the GB passenger rail network has seen unprecedented growth in patronage, with passenger kilometres doubling over a 20-year period. This pattern of growth is expected to continue into the future, driven by population growth, increasing road congestion and the impact of major investments in both rolling stock and infrastructure. More widely the European Commission has set challenging targets for growth of both passenger and freight; and envisages enhanced competition as one means of both increasing quality (and in turn demand), whilst also improving efficiency.Against this background, a key - and inter-connected - challenge facing the GB rail industry is to manage increasing demand (encompassing both passenger and freight) whilst also maintaining and enhancing performance (encompassing both punctuality and cancellations). Maintaining an ever-busier network in good condition, simultaneously driving reduced costs through efficiency gains, whilst also managing upgrades to capacity, is a major challenge facing the industry.In response to this challenge, the railway in GB is undergoing an unprecedented level of investment, in terms of both the day-to-day renewal of the railway network, as well as new schemes designed to enhance capacity and improve services, for example through platform lengthening, signaling and train control solutions, electrification, new train fleets and new railway lines.This context provokes the overall aim of the proposed PhD research: to use innovative methods and datasets to investigate the trade-offs facing a growing railway in respect of costs, capacity improvements and performance. Importantly the research will incorporate a user (passenger; freight) perspective at its heart, whilst looking at the overall societal costs and benefits (including firms and government). Ultimately the research aims to deliver impact through addressing the question of how the GB rail network can deliver improvements to the quantity and quality of services, at minimum cost, balancing both the short and long term. The research of course has generalizable implications for other railways internationally.