The need for proactive maintenance is increasing within railway infrastructure management due to the capacity requirement. The business environment of railway transport could be described as a multi-stakeholder model which requires intelligent infrastructure with monitoring capability of the operation to facilitate sustainable transport system. The demand to support and extend the design life time of railway infrastructure as well as their dependability during the life is also another concern which requires adequate management of the maintenance process. An approach to meet this challenge and demands is implementing proactive maintenance strategy, in which prognostic health management of wheel condition is an integral part.

This article presents different monitoring system deployed in the railway transport, the monitoring system include wayside and on-board equipment. A case study of the wheel defects records from the detection system on the iron ore line of the Swedish transport administration is presented where the trends are shown and analysed. The development of the wheel condition monitoring, from only wheel defects detection to both wheel defects detection and wheel profile measurement is discussed.

Finally the need for e-maintenance solution, to facilitate the anticipated prognostic aspect in wheel condition measurement is elaborated. This will support effective maintenance decisions that are required for a competitive and sustainable transport system which in turn enhances inherent network capacity.