Citing evidence of an “unqualified success,” the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit found a Federal Railroad Administration decision to delay rollout of a high-tech inspection process for railroad track was arbitrary and capricious.

At issue is the continued testing of a technology called Automated Track Inspection, which employs a device on unmanned train cars that travel the rails and uses lasers and sensors to identify internal defects and other flaws invisible to the human eye.