Track circuits play a major role in railway signaling. In some exceptional conditions, poor rail/wheel contact conditions may lead to a non-detection of the train on the zone. A presentation of the principle of detection by track circuits is proposed to introduce the existing detection criterion. The aim of the paper is first to present new detection approaches based on signal processing on an experiment with a dedicated train running on a track equipped with a track circuit. The second objective is to present a strategy to test new detection criteria on commercial zones over a long period of time (a few months) with the help of the PEGASE acquisition board. PEGASE has been developed by IFSTTAR and the presented work is the result of SNCF/IFSTTAR collaboration.