Amtrak Rail Trespasser Analysis using a GIS Space-Time Approach

Abstract

This research explores Amtrak trespass incident data from 2011 to 2019 using a GIS spatiotemporal process. The objective is to evaluate incident characteristics based on space, time, incident factors, and statistical significance. Incidents were first analyzed at the megaregional level, revealing Northern and Southern California as the highest trespassing risk in the country, followed by the Northeast and Great Lakes megaregions. A new standardized point density approach was applied to reveal incident clusters representing high-risk localities. Then, the optimized and emerging hot spot methods were applied to the top four megaregions. The results showed four Amtrak corridors as hot spots, including three along coastal California railways and the Philadelphia region. Trends for incident report factors were analyzed (e.g., pre-crash activity, time of day, location of impact). “Walking” prior to impact, occurrence in the “afternoon,” and crash location “on the tracks” were found to be the most prominent incident characteristics for those factors.

A Systematic Review of Railway Trespassing: Problems and Prevention Measures

“…Similarly, maps from different historical periods can be used to analyse how urbanisation has affected the frequency of trespassing (GIS) [49] or how the construction of railways started the process of urbanisation (impact on demographic differences in regions, between urban and rural areas) [50]. To summarise, GIS tools can be used for different analyses, among which is the geographic analysis of locations of high trespassing frequency (risky locations on the railway tracks) [51]. Although there is no specific reference to trespassing in the study in the USA regarding two different neighbourhoods on different sides of a track, there is a possibility that different socio-economic and environmental characteristics of the two areas may influence the emergence of different trespass locations [52].…”