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Fouled Ballast Waiver Operations and Results

Current regulations require locations of noncompliant ballast to be remediated within 30 days or to be taken out of service, regardless of track class. In 2013, the Association of American Railroads (AAR) applied for a waiver to the current regulations that proposed a track class specific...

Concrete Tie Performance in Degraded Track Conditions

FRA and RailTEC at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign examined the performance of degraded concrete crossties installed on U.S. high-speed rail and joint passenger/freight rail corridors.  Research showed that center binding conditions often led to flexural cracks in concrete...