The relationships of climate and terrain to maintenance of way on the Norfolk Southern Railroad between Norfolk, Virginia, and Portsmouth, Ohio

The relationships of climate and terrain to maintenance of way on the Norfolk Southern railroad between Norfolk, Virginia, and Portsmouth, Ohio, are considered as environmental factors affecting maintenance-of-way costs for the railroad. A detailed analysis of the distribution of actual maintenance-of-way problems along the route is conducted, using 54 Railroad Study Units and 10 climate and terrain variables (local relief, side slopes, sinuosity ratio, total track curvature, freeze/thaw cycles, flood and landslide potentials, annual number of days with precipitation greater than 0.1 inch, extent of cut and fill, and an engineering soil rating), to develop Railroad Maintenance Factors (RMF's). From these RMF's, Railroad Maintenance Zones (RMZ's) can be identified along the 540 miles of the study route. The maintenance zones range from a Very Low RMZ on the Gulf Atlantic Coastal Flats in Virginia to a Very High RMZ in the upper reaches of the Tug Fork River Basin in West Virginia. The relationships of climate and terrain to maintenance of way as manifested in the RMZ's can assist transportation planners in developing new routes or relocating existing routes to reduce long-term maintenance costs and to improve system efficiency. Extensions of the methods used in this study to other modes of ground transportation and to other regions would enhance the geographical understanding of the relationships between land-surface systems and ground transportation networks. Military applications of the study to military logistics contingency planning are also presented.