Forests as natural metamaterial barriers for urban railway-induced vibration attenuation

Noise and vibrations generated by railway traffic can seriously affect the adjacent buildings and their residents. Different mitigation methods have been proposed in the past decades to tackle this challenge. Despite many mitigation measures presented in the literature, some of these measures have shown limitations in their application, while for others their carbon footprint does not justify their implementation in real projects. This study introduces the concept of forests as natural metamaterials to attenuate the vibrations generated at the wheel-rail interaction. In particular, a group of natural metamaterials, in the form of a forest, is introduced into a vehicle/track/soil validated model based on the two-step approach. The ideal tree/soil unit-cell constituting the forest is obtained through a parametric investigation of the geometrical and material properties in order to have the first band-gap within the main range of frequencies generated by railway traffic in urban areas. The vibration attenuation levels obtained by the introduction of the natural metamaterial are then evaluated by considering a range of operational velocities for the T2000 Brussels tram LRV (Light Rail Vehicle). Finally, some insights on the attenuation efficiency of the selected forest towards vibrations generated by HSTs (High-Speed Trains) are given by considering a mono-wheel model with a higher range of vehicle speeds.