Machine learning-assisted macro simulation for yard arrival prediction

Increasing the modal share of the single wagonload transport in Europe requires improving the reliability and predictability of freight trains running between the yards. In this paper, we propose a novel machine learning-assisted macro simulation framework to increase the predictability of yard departures and arrivals. Machine learning is applied through a random forest algorithm to implement a yard departure prediction model. Our yard departure prediction approach is less complex compared to previous yard simulation approaches, and provides an accuracy level of 92% in predictions. Then, departure predictions assist a macro simulation network model (PROTON) to predict arrivals to the succeeding yards. We tested this framework using data from a stretch between two main yards in Sweden; our experiments show that the current framework performs better than the timetable and a basic machine learning arrival prediction model by $R^2$ of 0.48 and a mean absolute error of 35 minutes. Our current results indicate that combination of approaches, including yard and network interactions, can yield competitive results for complex yard arrival time prediction tasks which can assist yard operators and infrastructure managers in yard re-planning processes and yard-network coordination respectively.