A Real-Time Timetable Rescheduling Method for Metro System Energy Optimization under Dwell-Time Disturbances

Automatic Train Systems (ATSs) have attracted much attention in recent years. A reliable ATS can reschedule timetables adaptively and rapidly whenever a possible disturbance breaks the original timetable. Most research focuses the timetable rescheduling problem on minimizing the overall delay for trains or passengers. Few have been focusing on how to minimize the energy consumption when disturbances happen. In this paper, a real-time timetable rescheduling method (RTTRM) for energy optimization of metro systems has been proposed. The proposed method takes little time to recalculate a new schedule and gives proper solutions for all trains in the network immediately after a random disturbance happens, which avoids possible chain reactions that would attenuate the reuse of regenerative energy. The real-time feature and self-adaptability of the method are attributed to the combinational use of Genetic Algorithm (GA) and Deep Neural Network (DNN). The decision system for proposing solutions, which contains multiple DNN cells with same structures, is trained by GA results. RTTRM is upon the foundation of three models for metro networks: a control model, a timetable model and an energy model. Several numerical examples tested on Shanghai Metro Line 1 (SML1) validate the energy saving effects and real-time features of the proposed method.