Bayesian methodology incorporating expert judgment for ranking countermeasure effectiveness under uncertainty: Example applied to at grade railroad crossings in Korea

This paper describes the formalization and application of a methodology to evaluate the safety benefit of countermeasures in the face of uncertainty. To illustrate the methodology, 18 countermeasures for improving safety of at grade railroad crossings (AGRXs) in the Republic of Korea are considered. Akin to “stated preference” methods in travel survey research, the methodology applies random selection and laws of large numbers to derive accident modification factor (AMF) densities from expert opinions. In a full Bayesian analysis framework, the collective opinions in the form of AMF densities (data likelihood) are combined with prior knowledge (AMF density priors) for the 18 countermeasures to obtain ‘best’ estimates of AMFs (AMF posterior credible intervals). The countermeasures are then compared and recommended based on the largest safety returns with minimum risk (uncertainty). To the author's knowledge the complete methodology is new and has not previously been applied or reported in the literature. The results demonstrate that the methodology is able to discern anticipated safety benefit differences across candidate countermeasures. For the 18 at grade railroad crossings considered in this analysis, it was found that the top three performing countermeasures for reducing crashes are in-vehicle warning systems, obstacle detection systems, and constant warning time systems.

Property Agents and Motor Dealers Act : strike three

The Tourism, Racing and Fair Trading (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2002 (“the Act”) which was passed on 18 April 2002 contains a number of significant amendments relevant to the operation of the Property Agents and Motor Dealers Act 2000. The main changes relevant to property transactions are: (i) Changes to the process for appointment of a real estate agent and consolidation of the appointment forms; (ii) Additions to the disclosure obligation of agents and property developers; (iii) Simplification of the process for commencing the cooling off period; (iv) Alteration of the common law position concerning when the parties are bound by a contract; (v) Removal of the requirement for a seller’s signature on the warning statement to be witnessed; (vi) Retrospective amendment of s 170 of the Body Corporate and Community Management Act 1997; (vii) Inclusion of a new power to allow inspectors to enter the place of business of a licensee or a marketeer without consent and without a warrant; and (viii) Inclusion of a new power for inspectors to require documents to be produced by marketeers. The majority of the amendments are effective from the date of assent, 24 April 2002, however, some of the amendments do not commence until a date fixed by proclamation. No proclamation has been made at the time of writing (2 May 2002). Where the amendments have not commenced this will be noted in the article. Before providing clients with advice, practitioners should carefully check proclamation details.

Greener and leaner : unleashing capacity of railroad concrete ties via limit states concept

New knowledge has raised a concern about the cost-ineffective design methods and the true performance of railroad prestressed concrete ties. Because of previous knowledge deficiencies, railway civil and track engineers have been aware of the conservative design methods for structural components in any railway track that rely on allowable stresses and material strength reductions. In particular, railway sleeper (or railroad tie) is an important component of railway tracks and is commonly made of prestressed concrete. The existing code for designing such components makes use of the permissible stress design concept, whereas the fiber stresses over cross sections at initial and final stages are limited by some empirical values. It is believed that the concrete ties complying with the permissible stress concept possess unduly untapped fracture toughness, based on a number of proven experiments and field data. Collaborative research run by the Australian Cooperative Research Centre for Railway Engineering and Technologies (Rail CRC) was initiated to ascertain the reserved capacity of Australian railway prestressed concrete ties that were designed using the existing design code. The findings have led to the development of a new limit-states design concept. This paper highlights the conventional and the new limit-states design philosophies and their implication to both the railway community and the public. © 2011 American Society of Civil Engineers.

The noblest of professions : schoolmasters at Hastings 1872-1894

The Noblest of Professions: Schoolmasters at Hastings 1872-1894 is a skilfully developed study of educational developments outside the Australian metropolises and in a small, but significant, pioneering rural community in the late colonial period. It is an important contribution to the formerly neglected field of local and regional history in Australia. It extends our knowledge of the life experiences of the schoolmaster in an isolated community and the regard local people had for him, together with the significant and varied social and leadership roles he played regularly and occasionally in rural affairs. The rural schoolmaster and his concerns are vividly brought to life in a compelling portrayal in this book. In all a very significant contribution to Australian history and to the history of education in its regional and local context.

Service condition of railroad corridors around the insulated rail joints

Railroad corridors contain large number of Insulated Rail Joints (IRJs) that act as safety critical elements in the circuitries of the signaling and broken rail identification systems. IRJs are regarded as sources of excitation for the passage of loaded wheels leading to high impact forces; these forces in turn cause dips, cross levels and twists to the railroad geometry in close proximity to the sections containing the IRJs in addition to the local damages to the railhead of the IRJs. Therefore, a systematic monitoring of the IRJs in railroad is prudent to mitigate potential risk of their sudden failure (e.g., broken tie plates) under the traffic. This paper presents a simple method of periodic recording of images using time-lapse photography and total station surveying measurements to understand the ongoing deterioration of the IRJs and their surroundings. Over a 500 day period, data were collected to examine the trends in narrowing of the joint gap due to plastic deformation the railhead edges and the dips, cross levels and twists caused to the railroad geometry due to the settlement of ties (sleepers) around the IRJs. The results reflect that the average progressive settlement beneath the IRJs is larger than that under the continuously welded rail, which leads to excessive deviation of railroad profile, cross levels and twists.

Compaction control of topography and fault network structure along strike-slip faults in sedimentary basins

Strike-slip faults commonly display structurally complex areas of positive or negative topography. Understanding the development of such areas has important implications for earthquake studies and hydrocarbon exploration. Previous workers identified the key factors controlling the occurrence of both topographic modes and the related structural styles. Kinematic and stress boundary conditions are of first-order relevance. Surface mass transport and material properties affect fault network structure. Experiments demonstrate that dilatancy can generate positive topography even under simple-shear boundary conditions. Here, we use physical models with sand to show that the degree of compaction of the deformed rocks alone can determine the type of topography and related surface fault network structure in simple-shear settings. In our experiments, volume changes of ∼5% are sufficient to generate localized uplift or subsidence. We discuss scalability of model volume changes and fault network structure and show that our model fault zones satisfy geometrical similarity with natural flower structures. Our results imply that compaction may be an important factor in the development of topography and fault network structure along strike-slip faults in sedimentary basins.

Eight dead, 70 missing as flash floods strike Queensland

"Eight people are dead and there are grave fears the toll may rise with at least 70 missing after flash floods swept through southeastern Queensland."

TPP draft reveals surgical strike on public health

On 13 November, WikiLeaks released a secret draft text of the Intellectual Property Chapter of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). The text reveals substantive proposals for expanded protection in respect of copyright, patent, trade mark and trade secrets law, and intellectual property enforcement.

AITPM Email Newsletter Volume 0905, June 2009 : President's Message

President’s Message Hello fellow AITPM members, Due to three colliding forces of nature I find myself writing this month’s message from home – today, I am still getting over a persistent virus that seemed to set in just after returning from Singapore a couple of weeks ago, which my diabetes won’t let me get away with too easily (no Kermit the Frog swine flu jokes please). Combine this with a very wet day in Brisbane – in fact the wettest for 20 years (how can we complain, except for flash flooding?). And in Queensland today is a state school teachers’ strike, so one half of our brood is over watching TV. Family snapshots aside, the biggest news for our industry of late is the $8.5 billion announced in the Federal Budget for transport infrastructure projects; many “shovel ready”, but some – and fortunate for our profession – desktop ready. This newsletter provides nationwide coverage on the transport infrastructure aspects of the Federal Budget. We’ll need a bit more time to carefully look at the ensuing State Budgets’ announcements. Regarding the federal budget announcements, I am pleased to see serious attention being paid to upgrading the M1 system – I hope to see a motorway standard facility connecting Adelaide to at least Rockhampton in my lifetime. But some other important roads are of course missing out in this particular budget. Various levels of commitment are being made to urban passenger rail – some project significant while others planning significant. Enhancement of suburban rail is important across the capitals and Australia’s medium sized cities such as the Gold Coast and Newcastle. Not much on road safety initiatives jumped out at me, but I believe it is implied in the large road projects and in some of the detail elsewhere. I do believe it’s about time a ‘Vision Zero’ style policy is adopted at the National level, since any death is unacceptable on the road, just as it is in any other workplace. So, overall some good news on building transport infrastructure to keep the economy purring during this recession, and strongly supporting it during future boom times. The other edge to the sword, of course, is that we tax payers will be paying a considerable amount for borrowings for these projects over a long period of time. I close again in reminding everyone again that AITPM’s flagship event, the 2009 AITPM National Conference, Traffic Beyond Tomorrow, is being held in Adelaide from 5 to 7 August. www.aitpm.com has all of the details about how to register, sponsor a booth, session, etc. Best regards all, Jon Bunker

Transaction Cost Analysis of PPP Risk Share

PPP (Public Private Partnerships) is a new operation mode of infrastructure projects, which usually undergo long periods and have various kinds of risks in technology, market, politics, policy, finance, society, natural conditions and cooperation. So the government and the private agency should establish the risk-sharing mechanism to ensure the successful implementation of the project. As an important branch of the new institutional economics, transaction cost economics and its analysis method have been proved to be beneficial to the proper allocation of risks between the two parts in PPP projects and the improvement of operation efficiency of PPP risk-sharing mechanism. This paper analyzed the transaction cost of the projects risk-sharing method and the both risk carriers. It pointed out that the risk-sharing method of PPP projects not only reflected the spirit of cooperation between public sector and private agency, but also minimized the total transaction cost of the risk sharing mechanism itself. Meanwhile, the risk takers had to strike a balance between the beforehand cost and the afterwards cost so as to control the cost of risk management. The paper finally suggested three ways which might be useful to reduce the transaction cost: to choose appropriate type of contract of PPP risk-sharing mechanism, to prevent information asymmetry and to establish mutual trust between the two participants.

Trends in online journalism : a case study approach based on euaustralia online

This paper takes stock of current changes affecting journalism, and as a case study brings up to date the record of progress made with an online publishing enterprise, EUAustralia Online, first reported on in 2007. It perceives the development of news publishing on line as being in two sectors: media corporations moving to occupy the online publishing field, through complex business stratagems and product-making, and small publications enjoying low production costs and the ability to strike up relationships with numerous users, even on a mass scale. Recent developments in both major publishing and niche publishing are appraised in a literature review, considering both broad-scale industry trends; and pressure from fresh advances in information and communication technology to produce ever-more sophisticated media artefacts, like multi-platform news coverage. The paper also recounts the pattern of work on EUAustralia Online, showing how such publications, ubiquitous ‘blogs’ or newsletters, may be placed in a prospective online order, where large and small operations might co-exist.

Promoting creativity in education : from policy to practice : an Australian perspective

In the 21st century, our global community is changing to increasingly value creativity and innovation as driving forces in our lives. This paper will investigate how educators need to move beyond the rhetoric to effective practices for teaching and fostering creativity. First, it will describe the nature of creativity at different levels, with a focus on personal and everyday creativity. It will then provide a brief snapshot of creativity in education through the lens of new policies and initiatives in Queensland, Australia. Next it will review two significant areas related to enriching and enhancing students’ creative engagement and production: 1) influential social and environmental factors; and 2) creative self-efficacy. Finally, this paper will propose that to effectively promote student creativity in schools, we need to not only emphasise policy, but also focus on establishing a shared discourse about the nature of creativity, and researching and implementing effective practices for supporting and fostering creativity. This paper has implications for educational policy, practice and teacher training that are applicable internationally.

Where the bloody hell does parody fit in Australian copyright law?

This article examines the role of the recently introduced fair dealing exception for the purposes of parody and satire in Australian copyright law. Parody and satire, while central to Australian expression, pose a substantial challenge for copyright policy. The law is asked to strike a delicate balance between an author’s right to exploit their work, the interests of the public in stimulating free speech and critical discussion, the rights of artists who rely on existing material in creating their own expression, and the rights of all artists in their reputation and the integrity of their works. This article highlights the difficulty parodists and satirists have historically faced in Australia and examines the potential of the new fair dealing exceptions to relieve this difficulty. This article concludes that the new exceptions have the potential, if read broadly, not only to bridge the gap between humorous and non-humorous criticism, but also to allow for the use of copyright material to critique figures other than the copyright owner or author, extending to society generally. This article will argue that the new exceptions should be read broadly to further this important policy goal while also being limited in their application so as to prevent mere substitutable uses of copyright material. To achieve these twin goals, I suggest that the primary indication of fairness of an unlicensed parody should be whether or not it adds significant new expression so as not to be substitutable for the original work.