Special issue on work of the Cooperative Research Centre for Rail Innovation, Australia: Guest editorial

The Cooperative Research Centre (CRC) for Rail Innovation (www.railcrc.net.au) is the largest rail research program in the history of Australasian railways, with over $100m in resources being applied to the rail industry over seven years. It is a unique and productive initiative which links industry participants from Australia and overseas with the research and development expertise of seven of Australia’s leading universities. It has sponsored ground-breaking research into the rail industry and has supported high-level collaborative research projects to address research themes such as Performance, Safety and Security, Smart Technologies, Urban Rail Access, Climate Change and the Environment, and Workforce Development. It involves an interdisciplinary approach which recognises that the operation of railways involves, in addition to engineering and technical considerations, a variety of human factor issues, for example, safety awareness, planning, and training.