Safe Maintenance for Overhead Contact Lines

Objective:

Establish safety measures to be adopted in working on or nearby overhead contact lines. Mainly focusing on safety measures and the distances from live conductors to be adopted during the works to the traction installation.

The project started from the safety rules adopted by the European railways during the works to be done on or nearby live conductors and catenaries, taking into account the national laws, the railways rules and internal recommendations.

Because of the connection with the costs and the organisation of the work and with the aim of improvement the personnel safety it is necessary to homogenise the safety measures taking into account the Cenelec CENELEC European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardisation standards adopted for the electrical installation and the national laws.

The project particularly aimed to:

• Understand and compare the rules adopted by the different railways and compare the safety measures adopted during the works along the lines;
• List and compare the electrical safety distances, from the live conductors during the works, in use in the different railways;
• Improve the safety of the personnel working on the overhead contact lines or nearby live conductors;
• Promote field demonstrations for examining the danger situations and appreciate the probability of the risk for the workers involved;
• Recommend uniform procedures and give the minimum distances admitted for the different traction systems both in d.c. and a.c.

Results:

The project is linked with the new UIC leaflet 791-1 RI (Guidelines for maintenance of overhead contact lines), where different procedures and safety distances adopted by the Railways during the works on the overhead contact line were introduced.

• WP WP Work Package 1: guide to the assessment of the masonry arch bridges
• WP2: monitoring and inspection of masonry arches
• WP3: analysis of Low Cost Maintenance
• WP4: information database.