This book offers a comprehensive and practice-oriented guide to risk
management, with a special emphasis on the physical and environmental
risks related to the operations of railway systems. It is intended to
provide a roadmap for managing the risk by controlling safety. Starting
with a concise historical introduction and by presenting basic concepts
of risk management, the book describes in turn the railway systems and
their complexity. Then, it goes in depth into the process of risk
management, describing the main elements, from risk identification,
analysis and assessment to risk monitoring and communication. Different
risk assessment techniques are reviewed in detail, and the main
components of a risk management plan are presented. The book concludes
with an introduction to health risk management, describing strategies
for performing health risk assessments for staff in safety-critical
positions. Based on the conviction that controlling safety is the main
strategy in managing risk, and on the fact that the systems we would
like to control are complex ones, this book provides transport and
safety engineers with the necessary knowledge to effectively managing
the risks of the railway system.