Situation Analysis for Railway Safety: Adapting SOTIF for Passive Crossings

The research and development of automated to autonomous light rail vehicles, often referred to as people movers, has led to a need for situational analysis methods suitable for system-of-systems such as railways. This requirement becomes all the more important if people movers are to be used on conventional routes, i.e., “open track”. This paper therefore aims to apply the automotive “Safety Of The Intended Functionality” (SOTIF) approach to railways, using domain-specific adaptations of this approach. The applicability is demonstrated using the example of a railway crossing analysis. Passive railway crossings have the highest number of collisions between vulnerable traffic participants and railway vehicles. The idea is to use selected scenarios and scenes to identify and analyse critical situations in the crossing area, resulting in safety requirements. Fulfilment of these requirements ensures safe traffic in the crossing area by reducing hazards and accidents to an acceptable level.