About this episode

The episode discusses the PLPR train and its impact on railway technology and safety through machine learning.

This week we are talking about Network Rail's PLPR train - the incredible and now pretty experienced train that put machine learning into practice in a way that makes today's AI boosters look more like hucksters than they already are. Alex Cusdin joins us to talk through the train and its tech, and tell the story of how it came into being. Capturing an incredible 18TB of data a day, this train captures 70,000 photos a second to enable a very high resolution view of the track to automate and improve inspection, in the process making railways safer. This is an example, now well proven, of how technologies can be applied to make better use of skilled people, rather than displacing them. And it's about to be replaced. Support #Railnatter at https://patreon.com/garethdennis. Merch at https://merch.railnatter.uk. Join in the discussion at https://discord.railnatter.uk. You can also buy my book #HowTheRailwaysWillFixTheFuture: https://bit.ly/HowTheRailways

People in this episode

Host: Gareth Dennis

Guest: Alex Cusdin

Topics covered

• machine learning
• railway technology
• data capture
• railway safety
• automation
• AI

Keywords

• PLPR train
• Network Rail
• machine learning
• railway inspection
• AI
• data capture
• automation

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Network Rail

Products: PLPR train

Books & works: #HowTheRailwaysWillFixTheFuture

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