Highway/Railroad Grade Crossings Identification and Signing, HR-254, 1987

In 1982, Iowa's crossing warning identification system and signage at rail crossings were outdated, inconsistent and inadequate. Iowa's railroad system had been reduced and reorganized during the 1970's and many of the surviving railroad companies were unable to install new signs or devote staff to updating information. The preliminary engineering part of this project improved the information inventory about each crossing, provided for installation of identification tags and resulted in a comprehensive list of posts and signs eligible for replacement. The sign installation portion of this project resulted in erection of nearly 10,000 new crossbuck signs and 10,000 advance warning signs with high intensity reflectorization. In addition, new posts and multiple track signs were replaced where appropriate. Increased visibility of crossings for the motoring public has resulted from proper sign placement and use of high intensity reflectorization. The tagging has provided a consistent correct identification of crossings for accident reporting. The computer inventory of information about the crossings is now correct and provides for informed decision making to administrators of Federal and State crossing safety funds.

2016-2020 Iowa Transportation Improvement Program

This document describes planned investments in Iowa’s multimodal transportation system including aviation, transit, railroads, trails, and highways. This five-year program documents $3.2 billion of highway and bridge construction projects on the primary road system using federal and state funding. Of that funding, a little over $500 million is available due to the passage of Senate File 257 in February 2015. As required by Senate File 257, this program includes a list of the critical highway and bridge projects funded with the additional revenue. As with other recent programs, there continues to be uncertainty in federal funding for roads and bridges. The most recent federal authorization, Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century (MAP-21), will expire July 31, 2015. At the same time that MAP-21 expires and absent Congressional action, the federal Highway Trust Fund will no longer be able to provide funding at current levels. This could result in reduced federal funding reimbursement for projects already underway and/or full elimination of federal highway funding for new projects in federal fiscal year 2016. These two issues provide funding uncertainty with this program in fiscal year 2016 and beyond.

Implementation Manual — 3D Engineered Models for Highway Construction: The Iowa Experience; RB33-014, 2015

3D engineered modeling is a relatively new and developing technology that can provide numerous benefits to owners, engineers, contractors, and the general public. This manual is for highway agencies that are considering or are in the process of switching from 2D plan sets to 3D engineered models in their highway construction projects. It will discuss some of the benefits, applications, limitations, and implementation considerations for 3D engineered models used for survey, design, and construction. Note that is not intended to cover all eventualities in all states regarding the deployment of 3D engineered models for highway construction. Rather, it describes how one state—Iowa—uses 3D engineered models for construction of highway projects, from planning and surveying through design and construction.

XML y web semántica : estudio del impacto de las aplicaciones comerciales basadas en tecnologías de web semántica

Much has been written about the Semantic Web, on the theory, its possible applications, how to implement it, how to make it effective and commercially attractive ... However, this work aims to be more specific. It is attempted to address a detailed analysis of the technologies that use concepts and tools of the Semantic Web, verifying their actual usefulness, quantifying as far as possible the impact and trying to extrapolate data about its future.It will be an analysis of what the Semantic Web is, how it is defined, which languages are the most appropriate for their development, the commercial applications that can be developed with Semantic Web technology, the applications that are currently running with this technology what kind of deployment of the Semantic Web currently exists, the real use of the Semantic Web technology...

Statewide Transportation Improvement Program 2016-2019: Sorted by MPO and RPA, 2015

Iowa’s Statewide Transportation Improvement Program (STIP) has been developed in conformance with the guidelines prescribed by 23 U.S.C. and 49 U.S.C. The STIP is generated to provide the Federal Highway Administration and Federal Transit Administration a listing of all projects that are candidates for federal aid from the FHWA and FTA for the four federal fiscal years (FFY) 2016-2019. The 2016-2019 STIP was approved by FHWA and FTA on September 29, 2015. Preceding the listings of federal-aid candidates are general comments concerning Iowa’s public participation process for selection of federal-aid projects and the basis for funding the proposed projects. Documents evidencing the Iowa Department of Transportation’s authority to act concerning matters related to transportation, federal-aid expenditures, and approvals of metropolitan planning organizations’ (MPOs) transportation improvements programs (TIPs) have been provided in past STIPs and can be provided again upon request.

Final Report (SPR Project 90-00-RB10-012) on the Maintenance Asset Management Project Phase I, 2012

This project resulted in the development of a proof of concept for a features inventory process to be used by field staff. The resulting concept is adaptable for different asset classes (e.g. culverts, guardrail) and able to leverage existing DOT resources such as the videolog and LRS and our current technology platforms including Oracle and our GIS web infrastructure. The concept examined the feasibility of newly available technologies, such as mobile devices, while balancing ease of use in the field. Implementation and deployment costs were also important considerations in evaluating the success of the project. These project funds allowed the pilot to address the needs of two DOT districts. A report of findings was prepared, including recommendations for or against full deployment of the pilot solution.

Final Report (SPR Project 90-00-RB10-012) on the Maintenance Asset Management Project Phase II, 2013

This project resulted in the development of a proof of concept for a features inventory process to be used by field staff. The resulting concept is adaptable for different asset classes (e.g. culverts, guardrail) and able to leverage existing DOT resources such as the videolog and LRS and our current technology platforms including Oracle and our GIS web infrastructure. The concept examined the feasibility of newly available technologies, such as mobile devices, while balancing ease of use in the field. Implementation and deployment costs were also important considerations in evaluating the success of the project. These project funds allowed the pilot to address the needs of two DOT districts. A report of findings was prepared, including recommendations for a full deployment of a field data collection.

A Framework for Building Hypercubes Using MapReduce

The European Space Agency's Gaia mission will create the largest and most precise three dimensional chart of our galaxy (the Milky Way), by providing unprecedented position, parallax, proper motion, and radial velocity measurements for about one billion stars. The resulting catalogue will be made available to the scientific community and will be analyzed in many different ways, including the production of a variety of statistics. The latter will often entail the generation of multidimensional histograms and hypercubes as part of the precomputed statistics for each data release, or for scientific analysis involving either the final data products or the raw data coming from the satellite instruments. In this paper we present and analyze a generic framework that allows the hypercube generation to be easily done within a MapReduce infrastructure, providing all the advantages of the new Big Data analysis paradigmbut without dealing with any specific interface to the lower level distributed system implementation (Hadoop). Furthermore, we show how executing the framework for different data storage model configurations (i.e. row or column oriented) and compression techniques can considerably improve the response time of this type of workload for the currently available simulated data of the mission. In addition, we put forward the advantages and shortcomings of the deployment of the framework on a public cloud provider, benchmark against other popular solutions available (that are not always the best for such ad-hoc applications), and describe some user experiences with the framework, which was employed for a number of dedicated astronomical data analysis techniques workshops.

A Framework for Building Hypercubes Using MapReduce

The European Space Agency's Gaia mission will create the largest and most precise three dimensional chart of our galaxy (the Milky Way), by providing unprecedented position, parallax, proper motion, and radial velocity measurements for about one billion stars. The resulting catalogue will be made available to the scientific community and will be analyzed in many different ways, including the production of a variety of statistics. The latter will often entail the generation of multidimensional histograms and hypercubes as part of the precomputed statistics for each data release, or for scientific analysis involving either the final data products or the raw data coming from the satellite instruments. In this paper we present and analyze a generic framework that allows the hypercube generation to be easily done within a MapReduce infrastructure, providing all the advantages of the new Big Data analysis paradigmbut without dealing with any specific interface to the lower level distributed system implementation (Hadoop). Furthermore, we show how executing the framework for different data storage model configurations (i.e. row or column oriented) and compression techniques can considerably improve the response time of this type of workload for the currently available simulated data of the mission. In addition, we put forward the advantages and shortcomings of the deployment of the framework on a public cloud provider, benchmark against other popular solutions available (that are not always the best for such ad-hoc applications), and describe some user experiences with the framework, which was employed for a number of dedicated astronomical data analysis techniques workshops.

Transit Assistance Program for Iowa, 1975

This inventory of transit services in Iowa covers urban transit, intercity passenger bus carriers and charter operators, taxicab operations, rural transit services and special services, and includes the results of questionnaire and interview surveys, and the resulting recommendations. The recommendations urge a centralized source of data and expertise, a public information program, the utilization of federal aid, the continuance of existing transit services with no dimunition of service level, the establishment of new services in communities of over 20,000 population, the sponsorship of demonstrations in communities with populations of 10,000 to 20,000, and the development and improvement of rural transit service. Based on state and local community experience, recommendations are made concerning revenue sources to support transit in Iowa, and four alternative state transit assistance programs are presented.

Gestión de confianza en redes ad hoc

El despliegue de un esquema de confianza es fundamental para poder desarrollar servicios de seguridad que permitan administrar y operar una red. Sin embargo, las soluciones empleadas en las redes tradicionales no se adaptan a un entorno ad hoc debido a la naturaleza dinámica y sin infraestructura de estas redes. En el presente trabajo se propone un esquema de confianza práctico y eficiente basado en una infraestructura de clave pública distribuida, umbral y jerárquica, que no requiere sincronización temporal entre todos los nodos de la red. La autorización de usuarios en el sistema se hace a través de certificados de corta duración que eliminan la necesidad de mantener la publicación y diseminación de unas listas de revocación. Por otro lado, una entidad externa de confianza permite alargar la reputación de un usuario de la red más allá de la existencia de la propia red.

Pumpunvalitsimet integroidussa simulointiympäristössä

Työssä on tutkittu pumpun valintaa integroidussa simulointiympäristössä. Tutkimuksen avulla on tarkoitus kehittää tieto- ja malligallerian (Galleria) infrastuktuuria ja käytössä olevia työvälineitä siihen suuntaan, että ulkoisten valitsinkomponenttien implementoiminen Gallerian tietokantaan olisi lähitulevaisuudessa helppoa ja nopeaa. Prosessi-integraation tieto- ja malligalleria on infrastruktuurimäärittely ja työvälineistö prosessikomponenttien ja osaprosessien simulointiin tarvittavien malli- ja parametritietojen kirjastoimiseksi internetpohjaiseen tietokantaan, josta ne ovat simulointiohjelmien käyttäjien ja muiden prosessisuunnittelijoiden helposti saatavilla. Tutkimuksen kirjallisessa osassa on keskitytty tutkimaan pumpun valinnan etenemistä ja valintaan vaikuttavia tekijöitä prosessisuunnittelijan näkökulmasta. Tutkimuksen soveltavassa osassa luotiin pumpunvalitsin ja sitä testattiiin Galleria- ympäristöä vastaavassa kehitysympäristössä. Pumpunvalitsimen kehittämisessä on käytetty apuna laitevalmistajalta saatua prosessikomponenttitietoa. Pumpunvalitsimen toteutus perustuu pumpun hydrauliseen valintaan ja esimerkkitapauksena käytettiin keskipakopumppua

Euron käyttöönoton hallinta keskisuuressa yrityksessä

Työn tavoitteena oli laatia euron käyttöönottosuunnitelma. Ensin selvitettiin euron syntyvaiheet ja yhteisen valuutan käsittelysäännöt. Sen jälkeen käydään läpi eräs käyttökelpoinen suunnitelma euron käyttöönottamiseksi, johon kuuluu euron käyttöönoton and speed up the implementation of external selection components. Model and Parametrisation Gallery for Process Integration is specification of an infrastructure and a set of tools which are built for storing process component and model library data into an internet based database from where it can be easily used by simulator users and other process designers. This work consists of two parts. In the literature survey pump selection and the factors that affects selection particularly on process designers point of view are studied. In the applied part a pump selector was created and tested in the test environment which is comparable to Gallery environment. This was done to ease the deployment of the selector to the actual working environment. Process component data of a manufacturer was used on the development of the pump selector. The execution of the selector is based on the hydraulic selection of pumps. Centrifugal pump was used as an example case.

Trade-off between constitutive and inducible resistance against herbivores is only partially explained by gene expression and glucosinolate production.

The hypothesis that constitutive and inducible plant resistance against herbivores should trade-off because they use the same resources and impose costs to plant fitness has been postulated for a long time. Negative correlations between modes of deployment of resistance and defences have been observed across and within species in common garden experiments. It was therefore tested whether that pattern of resistance across genotypes follows a similar variation in patterns of gene expression and chemical defence production. Using the genetically tractable model Arabidopsis thaliana and different modes of induction, including the generalist herbivore Spodoptera littoralis, the specialist herbivore Pieris brassicae, and jasmonate application, constitutive and inducibility of resistance was measured across seven A. thaliana accessions that were previously selected based on constitutive levels of defence gene expression. According to theory, it was found that modes of resistance traded-off among accessions, particularly against S. littoralis, in which accessions investing in high constitutive resistance did not increase it substantially after attack and vice-versa. Accordingly, the average expression of eight genes involved in glucosinolate production negatively predicted larval growth across the seven accessions. Glucosinolate production and genes related to defence induction on healthy and herbivore-damaged plants were measured next. Surprisingly, only a partial correlation between glucosinolate production, gene expression, and the herbivore resistance results was found. These results suggest that the defence outcome of plants against herbivores goes beyond individual molecules or genes but stands on a complex network of interactions.

Riskianalyysi sisäisen valvonnan apuvälineenä

Tutkielman tavoitteena oli pyrkiä selvittämään Ilmatieteen laitoksen toiminnalliset ja taloudelliset riskit. Tämä toteutettiin Ilmatieteen laitoksen ulkoisten ja sisäisten sidosryhmien haastatteluiden perusteella. Riskeistä rakennettiin Ilmatieteen laitokselle riskianalyysimalli, jonka kautta riskejä voidaan laitoksessa systemaattisesti tarkastella. Riskianalyysin on myös tarkoitus toimia apuvälineenä laitoksen sisäistä valvontaa ja riskienhallintaa kehitettäessä. Riskianalyysissä riskejä arvioitiin riskiin sisältyvän kahden komponentin, todennäköisyyden ja seurausten, avulla. Näin saatiin riskit karkeasti vertailukelpoiseksi keskenään. Riskeistä muodostettiin ensin toimintokohtainen riskianalyysi, jonka jälkeen riskejä analysoitiin myös koko laitoksen tasolla. Riskejä ilmeni hyvin erilaisia: osaamiseen ja henkilöstöön liittyviä ja toisaalta pitkän tähtäimen strategisiin valintoihin liittyviä. Ilmatieteen laitoksen täytyy hallita toimintaansa ja toimintaympäristöönsä liittyvät muutokset ja olla uudistumiskykyinen. Täytyy myös huomata, että riskianalyysin lisäksi sisäisen valvonnan kehittämisessä on organisaation johdolla ja sisäisellä tarkastajalla tärkeä rooli.