Safety Culture: Assessment and continuous improvement – new requirement for safety and performance in railways

The recast Directive (EU) 2016/798 on Railway Safety introduces for thefirst time requirements on human factors and safety culture. Such requirementshas been part of the legislation in the aviation and nuclear domains for... [ view full abstract ]

The recast Directive (EU) 2016/798 on Railway Safety introduces for thefirst time requirements on human factors and safety culture. Such requirementshas been part of the legislation in the aviation and nuclear domains for sometime.

Introduction of new technologies as well as new business models in railwaysmeans automatic train operation as well as extensive use of outsourcing andsubcontractors which may affect working conditions, e.g. work hours, employmentconditions and turnover rates.

Assuring systematic work process for assessment and improvement ofsafety culture will in the future be a fundamental requirement for obtainingrailway safety certification and authorization. Also, ensuring good safetyculture will be an essential requirement for a successful business and safe andreliable operation. The inclusion of safety culture in the safety managementsystem as well as leadership commitment and skills in creating safety culture willbecome more important. This paper will present an approach for all actors inthe railway sector to assess and continuously improve safety culture in orderto meet new requirements.

The approach is based on important characteristics and attributes of agood safety culture based on research and state of the art in safety culture aswell MTO Safety´s extensive experience assessing and changing safety culture inthe nuclear, aviation, railway and maritime domains. An approach to assessingthese attributes in safety culture evaluations will be presented as well as howto use the results from the assessment to improve and change safety Culture.