Output details

Overcoming barriers to transferring systems engineering practices into the rail sector

The railway sector is interested in applying systems engineering approaches to major projects but typical railway projects differ significantly from those in domains where systems engineering was developed. The authors argue that this, together with a lack of agreement on the scope of systems engineering within the established rail disciplines, raises barriers to the effective and efficient adoption of systems engineering in the rail sector. Evidence gathered through case studies suggests that the system engineering community can lower barriers by showing in enhanced guidance how its adoption can reduce the incidence of project changes, change latency and, thus, project cost.