Safety of work on tracks

Track work refers to work carried out on the tracks or in their vicinity that may affect the safety of train traffic. In fact, the safe coordination of track work and train traffic has been a key challenge to railway safety for a number of years. 

The majority of track work in Finland is carried out on the state-owned railway network, which is managed by the Finnish Transport Infrastructure Agency. The Finnish Transport Infrastructure Agency reviews the development of safety occurrences in track maintenance by occurrence group. The starting point for the changes presented in the following table is the number of safety occurrences in 2017, which is used as a basis for comparison with the numbers for 2021, 2022, 2023 and 2024.

Table shows a positive development in the safety of track maintenance compared to 2017: the annual number of safety occurrences in track maintenance has decreased in almost all occurrence areas based on the comparison of the status in 2017 and 2024. A closer look shows, however, that this positive trend took a slight turn for the worse in 2023 (a decrease of -44% in 2023 vs. -52% in 2022), whereas the positive trend was back in 2024 (-55% in 2024). 

The number of occurrences increased compared to the previous year in the following categories: (i) collisions during track work or collisions due to obstacles due to track work, and (ii) errors in safety guard operations. In other occurrence groups, the number of occurrences decreased from the previous year.

In its safety report, the Finnish Transport Infrastructure Agency reviews the development of track work safety through the number of key occurrences and the success rate of work on tracks. The success rate is calculated by dividing the number of key occurrences by the track work permits granted. The success rate in 2024 was very similar to the rates in the previous three years – although the number of safety occurrences decreased slightly from the previous year. As shown in the figure below, there was a positive trend in safety of track work in 2017–2021. In recent years, however, this positive trend in safety has almost stalled.

The most common safety occurrences during track work include track work protection errors, neglecting to follow safety guidelines, unauthorised passing of the track work area, working without a track work permit, and errors involving the track work location and the opening of the track work site to traffic. The occurrence numbers were mainly very similar to those in previous years. An increase was observed in neglecting to follow safety guidelines and track work protection errors. Track work protection errors have shown an increasing trend for several years now, and as a result, a small working group was set up by the Finnish Transport Infrastructure Agency and Fintraffic Raide Oy in 2023 to put together proposals for measures aiming to improve the safety of track work and traffic management related to it. This group also continued its work in 2024.

The most serious track work accident occurred in Tikkurila in August as a track worker was hit by a passenger train and died of their injuries.