Abstract
M.Phil. (Engineering Management)
Efficiency is an essential indicator that measures operational performance for improv-ing freight reliability and client satisfaction. In the transportation industry, such as rail freight, it is primarily measured by on-time performance. When trains are performing poorly it affects projected tonnages and consequently results in client dissatisfaction. To broadly understand the operational inefficiencies during execution of the trains’ trip plan, an extensive literature review was conducted to investigate possible factors af-fecting efficient movement of trains and to determine measures which can be imple-mented for the improvement thereof. This is to ensure that challenges affecting on-time performance are managed in a more efficient way while ensuring that an objective of delivering freight reliably is met.
Questionnaires, archival records and document analysis were used to collect data in relation to challenges affecting efficient movement of trains. From the results, it was found that the primary causes of trains’ inefficiency were locomotive failures, defective perway and crew shortage. The poor performance of trains from Hotazel to Algoabaai, confirmed that the influence of long transit and high dwell times is affected by different delay conditions. As a solution to some of the problems, computerised scheduling tech-niques together with high quality infrastructure with sufficient capacity that meets cli-ents’ demands can improve train performance. The conclusion can be drawn that dif-ferent operational inefficiencies causes train throughput time to deviate from the sched-ule, resulting in poor reliability of freights. The research has contributed to the limited body of knowledge in South African freight railway operations research by identifying the nature of train inefficiency affecting the on-time performance of trains.