This comprehensive monograph addresses crucial issues in the protection of railway systems, with the objective of enhancing the understanding of railway infrastructure security. Based on analyses by academics, technology providers and railway operators, it explains how to assess terrorist and criminal threats, design countermeasures, and implement effective security strategies. In so doing, it draws upon a range of experiences from different countries in Europe and beyond. The book is the first to be devoted entirely to this subject. It will serve as a timely reminder of the attractiveness of the railway infrastructure system as a target for criminals and terrorists and, more importantly, as a valuable resource for stakeholders and professionals in the railway security field aiming to develop effective security based on a mix of methodological, technological and organizational tools. Besides researchers and decision makers in the field, the book will appeal to students interested in critical infrastructure protection.

This proceedings volume highlights the state-of-the-art knowledge related to optimization, decisions science and problem solving methods, as well as their application in industrial and territorial systems. It includes contributions tackling these themes using models and methods based on continuous and discrete optimization, network optimization, simulation and system dynamics, heuristics, metaheuristics, artificial intelligence, analytics, and also multiple-criteria decision making. The number and the increasing size of the problems arising in real life require mathematical models and solution methods adequate to their complexity. There has also been increasing research interest in Big Data and related challenges. These challenges can be recognized in many fields and systems which have a significant impact on our way of living: design, management and control of industrial production of goods and services; transportation planning and traffic management in urban and regional areas; energy production and exploitation; natural resources and environment protection; homeland security and critical infrastructure protection; development of advanced information and communication technologies. The chapters in this book examine how to deal with new and emerging practical problems arising in these different fields through the presented methodologies and their applications. The chapter topics are applicable for researchers and practitioners working in these areas, but also for the operations research community. The contributions were presented during the international conference "Optimization and Decision Science" (ODS2017), held at Hilton Sorrento Palace Conference Center, Sorrento, Italy, September 4 - 7, 2017. ODS 2017, was organized by AIRO, Italian Operations Research Society, in cooperation with DIETI (Department of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology) of University "Federico II" of Naples.

This comprehensive monograph addresses crucial issues in the protection of railway systems, with the objective of enhancing the understanding of railway infrastructure security. Based on analyses by academics, technology providers and railway operators, it explains how to assess terrorist and criminal threats, design countermeasures, and implement effective security strategies. In so doing, it draws upon a range of experiences from different countries in Europe and beyond. The book is the first to be devoted entirely to this subject. It will serve as a timely reminder of the attractiveness of the railway infrastructure system as a target for criminals and terrorists and, more importantly, as a valuable resource for stakeholders and professionals in the railway security field aiming to develop effective security based on a mix of methodological, technological and organizational tools. Besides researchers and decision makers in the field, the book will appeal to students interested in critical infrastructure protection.