As the next generation non-ballasted track, a "floating ladder track" was developed to realize less structure-borne noise and a very lightweight construction. The floating ladder track is a mass-spring system with a small mass. Frequency analysis of measured vertical vibration of a concrete trackbed proves that the floating ladder track can reduce vibration approximately 13 dB from that of the adjacent non-ballasted cross-tie track. This paper reports the design of ladder sleeper in consideration of the dynamic response by the high "impulsive wheel load" acting as a single pulse due to abnormal defects of wheeltread and/or railsurface and describes the environmental performance of floating ladder track.

Copyright (c) 2003 Railway Technical Research Institute