Benchmarking for Track Mechanized Maintenance System

Due to high fuel costs, commuters now a days prefer the railway mode of transit - in bringing them to work place and back to their homes.

But how these railway systems, which are usually owned and operated by the government, manage and maintain to provide the society and industry a dependable form of transportation?

Mr. Werayutdh Chuenchan prepared a case study which is entitled “Benchmarking for Track Mechanized Maintenance System: A case study of the State Railway of Thailand”.

This study is focused on the on-track mechanized maintenance in the SRT; identifying the advantages and disadvantages of general characteristics of railway contexts; the factors that affecting to time, cost, quality, and safety management of the on-track mechanized maintenance in the SRT; and applying the benchmarking concept to SRT track mechanized maintenance management.

He concluded that, in order to achieve the stated objectives, the understanding of general characteristics of railway contexts, on-track mechanized maintenance system and maintenance management concept are required. Then the principal of benchmarking is applied in finding the best practice of on-track maintenance management among the sections.

This is his abstract.

ABSTRACT

Presently, the State Railway of Thailand (SRT) faces a vast competition from the other transportation mode. If it is to survive as a viable mode it must considerably improve service quality and economic efficiency. The effectiveness and efficiency of railway maintenance system directly affects to railway service and its economy. To maintain a good performance of railway maintenance, the good management of track mechanized maintenance is required.

To apply the benchmarking methodology in order to find out the best practice of track mechanized maintenance, is a very effective tool that can assist the management in their pursuits of continuous improvement of their operations. Planning and executing consideration of track mechanized maintenance chief is one of measurement. Besides, working process management and working performance are also considered.

The results from the study show that quality consideration is the most significant for planning. Then safety, time, and cost are considered respectively. Once it executes the plan, the safety of their work is the most important. During working process, the supporting and cooperation from outside colleagues are required. The factors that affect to the cost performance of track mechanized maintenance section are labors cost, fuel cost, materials cost, and parts cost. The most affected factor is labor cost. The one, who has good performance in cost and time management, also gives high significant to time and cost planning. In other word, it is difficult to compare the working performance in term of quality if who is the best. Because of there are external factors that need to be considered such as the general characteristics of the railway contexts and collaboration of external colleagues.


Keywords; best practice, benchmarking, railway maintenance, track mechanized maintenance, working process, working performance