Proper asset management of the railway infrastructure is essential to meet the requirements of todays railway operation today. This work deals with a neglected aspect of track condition: irregularities in the rail surface caused by various phenomena and summarised under the term “short-wave effects”. A macro level evaluation reveals that even short-wave effects with small amplitudes of 0.1 mm accelerate the deterioration of track geometry. When severe short-wave effects are present, track geometry exhibits amplitudes that are 50-120 % higher than the average for the respective track section.The micro-level evaluation includes over 2,000 welded joints across five lines. These are assessed using four load application models to quantify the impact of short-wave effects and define intervention thresholds through statistical analysis. Several potential strategies are presented to counteract short-wave effects. Implementing one or more of the strategies described makes it possible to optimise asset management. Regimes that are currently reactive, preventive, or predictive can be moved to a proactive regime where the root causes of poor system behaviour are addressed before symptoms become apparent.