Engineering, Commercial and Operational Pressures 

The effective development and management of a railway depot involves a regular re-evaluation of how best to respond to changing engineering, commercial and operational pressures.

These changes may include:

• increased depot workloads
• revised depot layouts
• different staffing skills, mix and levels
• different fleet sizes
• new vehicle maintenance schedules

• changing failure rates, etc.  

The following are typical questions that Depot Managers may face:

• "operationally, where is the best place to put the new washing plant?"
• "how can we alter the depot shift patterns to maximise staff utilisation?"
• "exactly how will two more roads in the main shed influence depot capacity?"
• "how is the depot going to cope with the new fleet?"
• "can we realistically tender for that heavy overhaul contract and still expect to run next year’s timetable?"
• "how many staff can we move from nights to days and still ensure we cover the morning peak?"
• "what about fuelling trains on the way out rather than on the way in?"

• "what would happen if ....?"

Railway maintenance depots involve many complex inter-related activities. It is, therefore, not always obvious what effect a change in one area may have on the overall performance of a depot and its fleet of vehicles.

Managing The Change 

Traditional Approaches

Traditionally, the only ways to assess the impact of depot development and change have been:

• guesswork/"gut feel"
• build, and play with, scale models
• write spreadsheet models
• try it for real and see what happens.

All of these approaches, however, have one or more of the following shortcomings:

• Very expensive mistakes can occur
• Depot development stagnates through fear of failure
• Key staff are distracted from the day-to-day running of the depot.

Depot Modelling and Simulation

Mutual Consultants Limited can help today’s depot managers to ask and answer depot-related questions with the minimum of risk to engineering, commercial and operational performance. Our approach uses a modern sophisticated computer simulation package to model your railway maintenance depot. This computer model accurately simulates all your depot’s and fleet’s activities, carefully noting the net effects on performance caused by the interaction of a large number of variable factors. By using the software we provide the opportunity to test your ideas for change, and even fine tune them to your best advantage, before financial and other resources are committed in making the changes.

In summary, by using computer simulation we can investigate the very complex relationships between a large number of variable factors which ultimately govern the efficient operation of a railway depot.

Our Approach 

Mutual Consultants Limited’s approach to managing change in your depot involves the following steps:

1. requirements analysis - to ensure that we fully understand your requirements
2. data gathering - the simulation package requires a certain amount of data which fully describes train running, the depot and the fleet(s) which are to be modelled. This data is then used by the simulation package to model depot and fleet activity for as many simulated days as required
3. calibration - the model is "calibrated" by simulating the depot’s existing state and comparing the simulation output with actual depot performance
4. simulation - iterating to a solution by running the model, interpreting the output, altering the input and re-running the model. By making minor alterations to the data and re-running the simulation, we can "fine tune" the input and iterate to an optimum solution
5. reporting - all the above steps will be documented in summary and in full detail, providing you with the best possible information on which to base your final decisions for change.

Mutual Consultants Limited works closely with you at every one of the stages described above.

By adopting a structured approach, many parameters can be varied (either simultaneously or individually) allowing us to investigate many "what if?" scenarios. Furthermore, once the data has been gathered and a model set up, we can re-run the simulation in the future as new developments need to be assessed.

Benefits 

The major benefit of Mutual Consultants Limited’s approach is that it provides you with the opportunity to rapidly and safely test a variety of possible responses to changing engineering, commercial and operating pressures. More specifically, you can quickly determine the likely effects of, say:

• increased depot workloads
• revised depot layouts
• different staffing skills, mix and levels
• different fleet sizes
• new vehicle maintenance schedules

• changing failure rates, etc.

In addition, being able to confidently base your decisions on our modelling output may mean:

• eliminating a bottle-neck because that new washing plant is built in the best location
• maximum possible staff utilisation
• optimising the exact layout and size of the proposed shed extension
• smooth introduction of a new fleet of vehicles
• being confident of fulfilling the new heavy maintenance contract and running next year’s timetable
• moving the right number of staff from nights to days, and still covering the morning peak
• confirming that refuelling on the way out should not be tried in practice

• you now know "what would happen if ...?".

Crucially, you will be able to test these ideas and even fine tune them to your best advantage, before committing financial and other resources to them and without incurring expensive mistakes.

For more information on Managing Change in Railway Depots, please open our Railway Depot Modelling eBrochure.