Natural Risk Study - Report on Flood Hazard

About thirty thousands kilometers of high-speed lines are operated in the world up to 1st April 2015 (UIC, 2015). Furthermore, accordingly with 2015 expectations, and in spite of the development of other transport modes (such as the Maglev, automatic driving cars, improvements in aviation, etc.), by 2030-2035, the extension of the world high-speed rail network could reach more than 80,000 kilometers (UIC, 2015). However, the transport by rail is still vulnerable face to natural disasters, extreme climate conditions or particular geographic situations. Advanced technologies allow to anticipate some situations and to propose some tools to eliminate or at least limit the risks generated by the environment.
As a matter of fact, the capacity of the railway community and its research units to build, develop and expand some efficient measures of protection, is a major issue for the future and the credibility of high speed railway.
Aware of this impact, the International Union of Railways (UIC) wanted to study and identify risky situations, to measure their potential impact on high speed and intercity lines exploitation, and to list the state of the art on the measures permitting to limit their negative consequences. This main stake was the subject of a first report named “UIC - High Speed and Intercity natural risks, Synthesis” and produced in November 2012 (Lemaire et al., 2012). Then, a second report have been specifically dealt with the strong wind hazard, produced in November 2014 (Gonzva & Gautier, 2014), in order to analyze the impacts, the mitigation strategies and the existing scientific methodologies on this issue.
The present report deals with another natural hazard whose transport by rail is still vulnerable : the flood hazard.