Research Information System
International Journal of Advancements in Computing Technology, vol.7, no.3, pp.109-121, 2015 (Peer-Reviewed Journal)
Interlocking system is the most crucial part of the railway signaling system that ensures safe travel and transportation. In fixed block signaling systems (or namely, conventional railway systems), train movements are mainly rely on route reservation procedure. Identification of these routes including all prohibitions and the relations between railway field components are defined on a chart known as the interlocking table. Generation of the interlocking table for small-scaled railway fields (or stations) can be realized easily whereas generation of the interlocking table gets gradually difficult when the topology of the railway field becomes more complicated. In this study, with the help of a computer algebra toolbox named Mathematica©, a tool that automatically generates the interlocking table for stations operated by
fixed-block principle is explained. The main advantage of the developed tool is that, the railway field components such as the point machines and the signals are placed automatically for a drawn railway field. The accurateness of the generated interlocking table is also verified on model railway layout.