Purpose. State of railway track must meet the conditions of safety, comfort and smooth ride. The presence of irregularities deteriorates the dynamics of interaction of track and rolling stock, causes speed limiting, creates the possibility of movement safety violation. This brings up the question concerning the study of the factors leading to the possibility of track irregularities and the process of their development. The purpose of this paper is to analyse the processes of emergence and development of irregularities in the area of unequal vertical elasticity of railway track using mathematical modelling. Methodology. Railroad under the trains works as the system of elastic bodies, so the emergence and development of irregularities can be represented as the transition from elastic to permanent strain. Irregularity development will affect the dynamics of interaction between track and rolling stock not only at the wheel location directly in the area of irregularity, but also at a certain distance beyond. Therefore, to study the development of irregularities, including those along the track, it is necessary to model the process of wheel load movement along the area. The adopted model consists of a wheel set moving on inertia-free beam and resting on individual supports. It is described by Lagrange differential equations. The work introduced the hypothesis that the level of permanent strain is distributed in proportion to the dynamic deflection derivative. Findings. Location of vertical longwise irregularity does not necessarily reproduce the location of the problem area. While in operation the vertical irregularity extends not only in depth but also along the track, herewith the increase in length is accompanied by the displacement of local maxima and the emergence of new ones. This leads to the development of so-called «pits» when approaching unequal-elastic areas. Originality. The work provides further development of tasks for track and rolling stock interaction modelling, in particular aimed to take into account the unequal elasticity areas and their influence on the formation of the track irregularities. The paper proposes new approaches to modelling the transition from elastic to permanent strain that allows predicting the development of track irregularity sizes depending on the area characteristics. Practical value. The results obtained by the author can be used to determine the schedule for track equal elasticity renovation works, as well as to analyse the measures aimed at the prevention of irregularities in areas with variable elasticity of railway track.