Climate Change and Infrastructure Performance: Should We Worry About?

Although it has been known for a while that climate-related factors account for the performance development of infrastructure, it remains difficult for infrastructure manager to estimate the effect of the anticipated climate change. The impact of climate factors differs very much between geographical locations and therefore a climate change assessment requires a more detailed analysis of the particular network. In this paper data about actual infrastructure performance of two railway tracks in the Netherlands are correlated with regional climate data in order to model future performance and apply appropriate interventions to cope with climate change effects. The analysis revealed an opposite climate change effect. In winter time the number of incidents will decrease whereas in the summer time the number of incidents will increase.