CQUniversity Australia
 

Engaging Indigenous people within Higher Ed

CQUniversity's Office of Indigenous Engagement recently hosted a visit from the Oodgeroo Unit of Queensland University of Technology (QUT), at Rockhampton Campus.

Professor Anita Lee Hong, Director of the Oodgeroo Unit, and Lone Pearce, Project Officer, met with Office of Indigenous Engagement staff to discuss employment issues and best practice models for engaging Indigenous people within the higher education sector, including governance matters.

Full Details…

Other News…

Rail CRC helps trains run on time 

Published on 19 May, 2004 

Rail CRC, based at CQU Rockhampton, is attracting interest with a software project that may help trains run on time.

According to The Australian (May 18) newspaper, the Rail CRC is working on a bundle of real-time train scheduling and optimisation tools.

The Australian reports that the real-time dynamic train rescheduling system called 'Schedulemiser' is already in commercial use at a railway run by an iron ore company in north-west Western Australia.

PhotoID:1331 Marketer of the product, TMG International, is quoted as saying the system has been in use as a logistics planning tool linking mine and port operations with train movements.

The software reportedly generates thousands of viable train plans for a particular situation or network and presents the best to the train controller.

Another project called Freightmiser is being developed to give drivers advice on how to drive the train in an energy-efficient way.

This week's CRCA (CRC Association) media release on the research says the era of the cursing commuter and the frustrated freight forwarder may be nearing its end.

It says Rail CRC has developed a suite of smart tools which will help rail operators to integrate train timetables with crew availability and track maintenance, reduce congestion on busy lines and re-schedule long-haul networks in real time to avoid delays.

"Passengers don't always appreciate that running a rail network is an unbelievably complex task - because one little thing that goes wrong can have a knock-on effect all down the line," says Professor Roach.

One of the hardest jobs is to co-ordinate train timetables with crew rosters, locomotive fleet assignment and track and train maintenance.

Poor performance with any of these elements can have adverse effects on the others.

Even when one element is scheduled to work perfectly, this in itself may cause adverse outcomes with some other elements.

The interaction of so many complex parameters requires compromises to produce the best overall result.

The full text of the information is available at:.

http://www.railcrc.cqu.edu.au/uploads/crca-prmay04-theme3.pdf