1. A method of scheduling the use of a plurality of resources in a rail network in a first-time space domain having predetermined constraints, comprising: (a) transforming the network resources scheduling problem to a second domain by relaxing some of the predetermined constraints; (b) measuring the historical performance of the scheduled network resources; (c) performing a sensitivity analysis of the measured historical performance to identify the relative importance of a variable affecting the performance; and (d) solving the scheduling problem as a function of the identified relative importance; and (e) transforming the solved transformed network resources scheduling problem back to the first time-space domain.