Serious gaming useful in planning future scenarios for railways

To what extent can serious gaming play a role in the future of railway traffic in the Netherlands? ProRail and TU Delft have been putting this to the test since 2009 with highly innovative simulation and gaming projects under the title of the ‘Railway Gaming Suite’. The results are encouraging; the unique cooperation between TPM POLG , TPM Systems Engineering and ProRail has already yielded various smart solutions.

We met Arjo van Loo (Manager of the Innovation Department at ProRail), Sebastiaan Meijer (TPM POLG) and Rens Kortmann (TPM Systems Engineering) at De Inktpot, ProRail’s imposing, nostalgic head office in Utrecht. “Our first introduction to TPM was actually quite funny”, Arjo told us. “I started at ProRail as the Research Programme Manager. On my second day here I was dragged off to TU Delft for a session on gaming. I had absolutely no idea what it entailed, but by the end of the meeting I was completely convinced: if ProRail is how I think it is, serious gaming should get us on the right track. That is how the ball got rolling.”

Read the complete article in the Quarterly VIII/3, October 2010