Quantitative analysis of railroad train collisions in the United States

Chen-Yu Lin, Christopher P.L. Barkan, Department of Transportation and Logistics Management, College of Management, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, Rail Transportation and Engineering Center-RailTEC, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, The Grainger College of Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, Part F: Journal of Rail and Rapid Transit

Published online on June 23, 2026

Abstract

Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, Part F: Journal of Rail and Rapid Transit, Ahead of Print.
Train collisions are important because they are more likely to result in high consequence events compared to the two most common incident types on U.S. railroads, derailments and grade crossing collisions. On average, train collisions result in more ...