Manz, H.; Schnieder, E.; Slovák, R.:
Benefits of the Level Crossing Knowledge Management System for European Level Crossing Safety.
European Commission Workshop on Level Crossing Safety, April 2010.
SELCAT was a Co-ordination Action of the European Commission's 6th Framework Programme involving 24 partners from Europe, Asia and Africa dedicated to collect, structure, cluster, analyze and disseminate existing world-wide research results to stimulate new knowledge exchange in the area of level crossing safety. This project was coordinated by the Institute for Traffic Safety and Automation Engineering at the Technische Universität Braunschweig. SELCAT developed a web based knowledge management system (KMS). Its purpose was to effectively collect, easily access and structurally store level crossing related data. The KMS does not only consist of worldwide information and experiences concerning level crossings but also offers statistics which can be specifically evaluated concerning individual user requirements and parameters. This is a base for level crossing safety performance monitoring for European countries. An advanced web based user interface allows including country specific data (e.g. LC types, LC type specific accident statistics, information on LC populations, and other scaling data as train and track kilometers etc.) as well as to carry out user defined analysis (e.g. of collective LC risk) supported by different types of graphical diagrams. The SELCAT-KMS contains 201 classified level-crossing related documents as well as 10.000 accident data sets from 13 countries from 2004 to 2007 and give a unique opportunity for a statistical insight into accidents at level crossings in the countries focused. Furthermore it includes 15 deliverables of the SELCAT project giving an overview of the knowledge concerning level crossing appraisal, technology and methodology as well as minutes, slides and documents from dissemination events carried out during the project. This contribution proposes to continue the active operation of the SELCAT-KMS to collect and store level crossing related information and data and will line out the advantages of this work. The special benefit can be identified by the use in the European Level Crossing Forum (ELCF) which is made up of experts from different European countries. It can significantly support the exchange of their knowledge and expertise and justify the best practice by collected statistical data on the level crossing safety performance. The results can be used for the prevention of accidents at level crossings on European level.