Scheduling trains in a railway network is a fundamental operational problem in the railway industry. A
local feedback-based travel advance strategy is developed using a discrete event model of train advances
along lines of the railway. This approach can quickly handle perturbations in the schedule and is shown to
perform well on three time-performance criteria while maintaining the local nature of the strategy. If the
local strategy leads to a deadlock, a capacity check algorithm is applied that prevents deadlock, but requires
additional nonlocal information. Extensions to the strategy are developed for networks with double-track
sections and with variable train characteristics and priorities.
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