Planning for smart urban ecosystems : information technology applications for capacity building in environmental decision making

Since the industrial revolution, our world has experienced rapid and unplanned industrialization and urbanization. As a result, we have had to cope with serious environmental challenges. In this context, an explanation of how smart urban ecosystems can emerge, gains a crucial importance. Capacity building and community involvement have always been key issues in achieving sustainable development and enhancing urban ecosystems. By considering these, this paper looks at new approaches to increase public awareness of environmental decision making. This paper will discuss the role of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT), particularly Webbased Geographic Information Systems (Web-based GIS) as spatial decision support systems to aid public participatory environmental decision making. The paper also explores the potential and constraints of these webbased tools for collaborative decision making.

Augmenting competitiveness of cities through tourism planning : the role of collaborative decision support systems

Many cities around the globe are now considering tourism facilities and their remarkable revenues in order to become competitive in the global economy. In many of these cities a great emphasis is given to the cultural tourism as it plays an important role in the establishment of creative and knowledge-base of cities. The literature points out the importance of local community support in cultural tourism. In such context, the use of new approach and technologies in tourism planning in order to increase the community participation and competitiveness of cities’ cultural assets gains a great significance. This paper advocates a new planning approach for tourism planning, particularly for cultural tourism, to increase the competitiveness of cities. As part of this new approach, the paper introduces the joined up planning approach integrated with a collaborative decision support system: ‘the community-oriented decision support system’. This collaborative planning support system is an effective and efficient tool for cultural tourism planning, which provides a platform for local communities’ participation in the development decision process.

Providing innovative planning education experience : teaching regional planning in an international context

Rapidly changing economic, social, and environmental conditions have created a need for urban and regional planning practitioners who are resilient, innovative, and able to cope with the increasingly complex and cosmopolitan nature of major metropolitan areas. This need should be reflected in planning education that allows students to experience a diverse range of approaches to problems and challenges, and that exposes students to the diverse array of perspectives on planning issues. This paper investigates the outcomes of a collaborative regional planning exercise organised jointly by planning academics from both Queensland University of Technology and the International Islamic University of Malaysia, and involving planning students from both universities. The regional planning exercise consisted of a regional appraisal and report topics of the area under investigation, Klang Valley – Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. It culminated with the presentation of regional development strategies for the area, with a field trip to Malaysia being the cornerstone of the project. The collaborative exercise involved a series of workshops and seminars organised locally, in which both Australian and Malaysian planning students participated, as well as meetings with local and federal planning officials, and also a forum for Young Planners of Australian and Malaysian Planning Institutes. The experience attempted to bridge the teaching of theoretical concepts of regional planning and development and the regional, more professional knowledge of planning practice, as it relates to specific political, institutional and cultural contexts. A survey of participating students, from both Queensland University of Technology and the International Islamic University of Malaysia, highlights the benefits of such project in terms of leaning experience and exposure to different cultural contexts.

Dual-process action of exercise on appetite control : increase in orexigenic drive but improvement in meal-induced satiety

Background: Exercise could contribute to weight loss by altering the sensitivity of the appetite regulatory system. Objective: The aim of this study was to assess the effects of 12 wk of mandatory exercise on appetite control. Design: Fifty-eight overweight and obese men and women [mean (±SD) body mass index (in kg/m2) = 31.8 ± 4.5, age = 39.6 ± 9.8 y, and maximal oxygen intake = 29.1 ± 5.7 mL · kg–1 · min–1] completed 12 wk of supervised exercise in the laboratory. The exercise sessions were designed to expend 2500 kcal/wk. Subjective appetite sensations and the satiating efficiency of a fixed breakfast were compared at baseline (week 0) and at week 12. An Electronic Appetite Rating System was used to measure subjective appetite sensations immediately before and after the fixed breakfast in the immediate postprandial period and across the whole day. The satiety quotient of the breakfast was determined by calculating the change in appetite scores relative to the breakfast's energy content. Results: Despite large variability, there was a significant reduction in mean body weight (3.2 ± 3.6 kg), fat mass (3.2 ± 2.2 kg), and waist circumference (5.0 ± 3.2 cm) after 12 wk. The analysis showed that a reduction in body weight and body composition was accompanied by an increase in fasting hunger and in average hunger across the day (P < 0.0001). Paradoxically, the immediate and delayed satiety quotient of the breakfast also increased significantly (P < 0.05). Conclusions: These data show that the effect of exercise on appetite regulation involves at least 2 processes: an increase in the overall (orexigenic) drive to eat and a concomitant increase in the satiating efficiency of a fixed meal.

Action learning of online marketing via a global contest

Introduction: The Google Online Marketing Challenge is a global competition in which student teams run advertising campaigns for small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) using AdWords, Google’s text-based advertisements. In 2008, its inaugural year, over 8,000 students and 300 instructors from 47 countries representing over 200 schools participated. The Challenge ran in undergraduate and graduate classes in disciplines such as marketing, tourism, advertising, communication and information systems. Combining advertising and education, the Challenge gives student hands-on experience in the increasingly important field of online marketing, engages them with local businesses and motivates them through the thrill of a global competition. Student teams receive US$200 in AdWords credits, Google’s premier advertising product that offers cost-per-click advertisements. The teams then recruit and work with a local business to devise an effective online marketing campaign. Students first outline a strategy, run a series of campaigns, and provide their business with recommendations to improve their online marketing. Teams submit two written reports for judging by 14 academics in eight countries. In addition, Google AdWords experts judge teams on their campaign statistics such as success metrics and account management. Rather than a marketing simulation against a computer or hypothetical marketing plans for hypothetical businesses, the Challenges has student teams develop and manage real online advertising campaigns for their clients and compete against peers globally.

Robot path planning in dynamic environments using a simulated annealing based approach

Mobile robots are widely used in many industrial fields. Research on path planning for mobile robots is one of the most important aspects in mobile robots research. Path planning for a mobile robot is to find a collision-free route, through the robot’s environment with obstacles, from a specified start location to a desired goal destination while satisfying certain optimization criteria. Most of the existing path planning methods, such as the visibility graph, the cell decomposition, and the potential field are designed with the focus on static environments, in which there are only stationary obstacles. However, in practical systems such as Marine Science Research, Robots in Mining Industry, and RoboCup games, robots usually face dynamic environments, in which both moving and stationary obstacles exist. Because of the complexity of the dynamic environments, research on path planning in the environments with dynamic obstacles is limited. Limited numbers of papers have been published in this area in comparison with hundreds of reports on path planning in stationary environments in the open literature. Recently, a genetic algorithm based approach has been introduced to plan the optimal path for a mobile robot in a dynamic environment with moving obstacles. However, with the increase of the number of the obstacles in the environment, and the changes of the moving speed and direction of the robot and obstacles, the size of the problem to be solved increases sharply. Consequently, the performance of the genetic algorithm based approach deteriorates significantly. This motivates the research of this work. This research develops and implements a simulated annealing algorithm based approach to find the optimal path for a mobile robot in a dynamic environment with moving obstacles. The simulated annealing algorithm is an optimization algorithm similar to the genetic algorithm in principle. However, our investigation and simulations have indicated that the simulated annealing algorithm based approach is simpler and easier to implement. Its performance is also shown to be superior to that of the genetic algorithm based approach in both online and offline processing times as well as in obtaining the optimal solution for path planning of the robot in the dynamic environment. The first step of many path planning methods is to search an initial feasible path for the robot. A commonly used method for searching the initial path is to randomly pick up some vertices of the obstacles in the search space. This is time consuming in both static and dynamic path planning, and has an important impact on the efficiency of the dynamic path planning. This research proposes a heuristic method to search the feasible initial path efficiently. Then, the heuristic method is incorporated into the proposed simulated annealing algorithm based approach for dynamic robot path planning. Simulation experiments have shown that with the incorporation of the heuristic method, the developed simulated annealing algorithm based approach requires much shorter processing time to get the optimal solutions in the dynamic path planning problem. Furthermore, the quality of the solution, as characterized by the length of the planned path, is also improved with the incorporated heuristic method in the simulated annealing based approach for both online and offline path planning.

Planning for knowledge-based urban development : global perspectives

Purpose: The purpose of this article is to investigate the engineering of creative urban regions through knowledge-based urban development. In recent years city administrators realised the importance of engineering and orchestrating knowledge city formation through visioning and planning for economic, socio-cultural and physical development. For that purpose a new development paradigm of ‘‘knowledge-based urban development’’ is formed, and quickly finds implementation ground in many parts of the globe.----- Design/methodology/approach: The paper reviews the literature and examines global best practice experiences in order to determine how cities are engineering their creative urban regions so as to establish a base for knowledge city formation.----- Findings: The paper sheds light on the different development approaches for creative urban regions, and concludes with recommendations for urban administrations planning for knowledge-based development of creative urban regions.----- Originality/value: The paper provides invaluable insights and discussion on the vital role of planning for knowledge-based urban development of creative urban regions.

Reciprocity : where art meets the community : action research in response to artistic encounters and relationships

This practice-led research project examines some of the factors and issues facing artists working in the public domain who wish to engage with the community as audience. Using the methodology of action research, the three major creative projects in this study use art as a socio-political tool with the aim of providing an effective vehicle for broadening awareness, understanding forms of social protest and increasing tolerance for diversity. The three projects: Floodline November 7, 2004, Look in, Look out, and The Urban Terrorist Project, dealt with issues of marginalisation of communities, audiences and graffiti artists respectively. The artist/researcher is outlined as both creator and collaborator in the work. Processes included ephemeral elements, such as temporary installation and performance, as well as interactive elements that encouraged direct audience involvement as part of the work. In addition to the roles of creator and collaborator, both of which included audience as well as artist, the presence of an outside entity was evident. Whether local, legal authorities or prevailing attitudes, outside entities had an unavoidable impact on the processes and outcomes of the work. Each project elicited a range of responses from their respective audiences; however, the overarching concept of reciprocity was seen to be the crucial factor in conception, artistic methods and outcomes.

Realistic yet humanitarian? The comprehensive plan of action and refugee policy in Southeast Asia

The 1989 Comprehensive Plan of Action (CPA) has recently been described as a successful example of how to manage large protracted refugee flows. However, this article revisits the circumstances surrounding the CPA used to resolve the prolonged Indo-Chinese refugee crisis to highlight that part of its development was linked to the fact that Southeast Asian states refused to engage with proposed solutions, which did not include repatriation for the majority of the Indo-Chinese asylum seekers who were deemed to be ‘non-genuine’1 ( UNGA, 1989a) refugees. This resulted in the CPA often forcibly repatriating ‘non-genuine’ refugees, particularly near the end of its program. This article reviews the CPA in order to assess whether its practices and results should be repeated.

Railways, Urban Development and Town Planning in Britain: 1948–2008, Haywood R. Ashgate (2009). £65.00, ISBN: 9780754673927

This book is a thorough investigation of the relationship between land use planning and the railways in Britain, through review of the factors affecting the two sectors and their integration during the period of public ownership. The rationale behind the book is explained as a timely analysis of the dynamic correlation involving town planning and management of the railway in a period when growing congestion on the road network is forcing people to look for alternative modes and capacity is badly needed to accommodate this increased demand for travel. The book calls for a modal shift from road to rail for passenger and freight traffic.

Multi-objective mission flight planning in civil unmanned aerial systems

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) are emerging as an ideal platform for a wide range of civil applications such as disaster monitoring, atmospheric observation and outback delivery. However, the operation of UAVs is currently restricted to specially segregated regions of airspace outside of the National Airspace System (NAS). Mission Flight Planning (MFP) is an integral part of UAV operation that addresses some of the requirements (such as safety and the rules of the air) of integrating UAVs in the NAS. Automated MFP is a key enabler for a number of UAV operating scenarios as it aids in increasing the level of onboard autonomy. For example, onboard MFP is required to ensure continued conformance with the NAS integration requirements when there is an outage in the communications link. MFP is a motion planning task concerned with finding a path between a designated start waypoint and goal waypoint. This path is described with a sequence of 4 Dimensional (4D) waypoints (three spatial and one time dimension) or equivalently with a sequence of trajectory segments (or tracks). It is necessary to consider the time dimension as the UAV operates in a dynamic environment. Existing methods for generic motion planning, UAV motion planning and general vehicle motion planning cannot adequately address the requirements of MFP. The flight plan needs to optimise for multiple decision objectives including mission safety objectives, the rules of the air and mission efficiency objectives. Online (in-flight) replanning capability is needed as the UAV operates in a large, dynamic and uncertain outdoor environment. This thesis derives a multi-objective 4D search algorithm entitled Multi- Step A* (MSA*) based on the seminal A* search algorithm. MSA* is proven to find the optimal (least cost) path given a variable successor operator (which enables arbitrary track angle and track velocity resolution). Furthermore, it is shown to be of comparable complexity to multi-objective, vector neighbourhood based A* (Vector A*, an extension of A*). A variable successor operator enables the imposition of a multi-resolution lattice structure on the search space (which results in fewer search nodes). Unlike cell decomposition based methods, soundness is guaranteed with multi-resolution MSA*. MSA* is demonstrated through Monte Carlo simulations to be computationally efficient. It is shown that multi-resolution, lattice based MSA* finds paths of equivalent cost (less than 0.5% difference) to Vector A* (the benchmark) in a third of the computation time (on average). This is the first contribution of the research. The second contribution is the discovery of the additive consistency property for planning with multiple decision objectives. Additive consistency ensures that the planner is not biased (which results in a suboptimal path) by ensuring that the cost of traversing a track using one step equals that of traversing the same track using multiple steps. MSA* mitigates uncertainty through online replanning, Multi-Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) and tolerance. Each trajectory segment is modeled with a cell sequence that completely encloses the trajectory segment. The tolerance, measured as the minimum distance between the track and cell boundaries, is the third major contribution. Even though MSA* is demonstrated for UAV MFP, it is extensible to other 4D vehicle motion planning applications. Finally, the research proposes a self-scheduling replanning architecture for MFP. This architecture replicates the decision strategies of human experts to meet the time constraints of online replanning. Based on a feedback loop, the proposed architecture switches between fast, near-optimal planning and optimal planning to minimise the need for hold manoeuvres. The derived MFP framework is original and shown, through extensive verification and validation, to satisfy the requirements of UAV MFP. As MFP is an enabling factor for operation of UAVs in the NAS, the presented work is both original and significant.