Non-motorized public transport : a global review and analysis of trends and issues

Over recent decades there has been growing interest in the role of non-motorized modes in the overall transport system (especially walking and cycling for private purposes) and many government initiatives have been taken to encourage these active modes. However there has been relatively little research attention given to the paid form of non-motorized travel which can be called non-motorized public transport (NMPT). This involves cycle-powered vehicles which can carry several passengers (plus the driver) and a small amount of goods; and which provide flexible hail-and-ride services. Effectively they are non-motorized taxis. Common forms include cycle-rickshaw (Bangladesh, India), becak (Indonesia), cyclos (Vietnam, Cambodia), bicitaxi (Columbia, Cuba), velo-taxi (Germany, Netherland), and pedicabs (UK, Japan, USA). --------- The popularity of NMPT is widespread in developing countries, where it caters for a wide range of mobility needs. For instance in Dhaka, Bangladesh, rickshaws are the preferred mode for non-walk trips and have a higher mode share than cars or buses. Factors that underlie the continued existence and popularity of NMPT in many developing countries include positive contribution to social equity, micro-macro economic significance, employment creation, and suitability for narrow and crowded streets. Although top speeds are lower than motorized modes, NMPT is competitive and cost-effective for short distance door-to-door trips that make up the bulk of travel in many developing cities. In addition, NMPT is often the preferred mode for vulnerable groups such as females, children and elderly people. NMPT is more prominent in developing countries but its popularity and significance is also gradually increasing in several developed countries of Asia, Europe and parts of North America, where there is a trend for the NMPT usage pattern to broaden from tourism to public transport. This shift is due to a number of factors including the eco-sustainable nature of NMPT; its operating flexibility (such as in areas where motorized vehicle access is restricted or discouraged through pricing); and the dynamics that it adds to the urban fabric. Whereas NMPT may have been seen as a “dying” mode, in many cities it is maintaining or increasing its significance and with potential for further growth. --------- This paper will examine and analyze global trends in NMPT incorporating both developing and developed country contexts and issues such as usage patterns; NMPT policy and management practices; technological development; and operational integration of NMPT into the overall transport system. It will look at how NMPT policies, practices and usage have changed over time and the differing trends in developing and developed countries. In particular, it will use Dhaka, Bangladesh as a case study in recognition of its standing as the major NMPT city in the world. The aim is to highlight NMPT issues and trends and their significance for shaping future policy towards NMPT in developing and developed countries. The paper will be of interest to transport planners, traffic engineers, urban and regional planners, environmentalists, economists and policy makers.

Rethinking genre studies through distribution analysis : issues in international horror movie circuits

The existence of any film genre depends on the effective operation of distribution networks. Contingencies of distribution play an important role in determining the content of individual texts and the characteristics of film genres; they enable new genres to emerge at the same time as they impose limits on generic change. This article sets out an alternative way of doing genre studies, based on an analysis of distributive circuits rather than film texts or generic categories. Our objective is to provide a conceptual framework that can account for the multiple ways in which distribution networks leave their traces on film texts and audience expectations, with specific reference to international horror networks, and to offer some preliminary suggestions as to how distribution analysis can be integrated into existing genre studies methodologies.

Control issues for velocity sourced Series Elastic Actuators

The Series Elasic Actuator has been proposed as a method for providing safe force or torque based acutation for robots that interact with humans. In this paper we look at some outstanding issues in the implementation and control of Series Elastic Actuators. The study addresses issues in making the Series Elastic Actuator respond effectively in the presence of physical difficulties such as restriction, using a computation efficient controller. The improvement over previous implementations is achieved by treating the motor as a velocity source to the elastic element, rather than as a torque source.

Bayesian hybrid algorithms and models : implementation and associated issues

This thesis addresses computational challenges arising from Bayesian analysis of complex real-world problems. Many of the models and algorithms designed for such analysis are ‘hybrid’ in nature, in that they are a composition of components for which their individual properties may be easily described but the performance of the model or algorithm as a whole is less well understood. The aim of this research project is to after a better understanding of the performance of hybrid models and algorithms. The goal of this thesis is to analyse the computational aspects of hybrid models and hybrid algorithms in the Bayesian context. The first objective of the research focuses on computational aspects of hybrid models, notably a continuous finite mixture of t-distributions. In the mixture model, an inference of interest is the number of components, as this may relate to both the quality of model fit to data and the computational workload. The analysis of t-mixtures using Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) is described and the model is compared to the Normal case based on the goodness of fit. Through simulation studies, it is demonstrated that the t-mixture model can be more flexible and more parsimonious in terms of number of components, particularly for skewed and heavytailed data. The study also reveals important computational issues associated with the use of t-mixtures, which have not been adequately considered in the literature. The second objective of the research focuses on computational aspects of hybrid algorithms for Bayesian analysis. Two approaches will be considered: a formal comparison of the performance of a range of hybrid algorithms and a theoretical investigation of the performance of one of these algorithms in high dimensions. For the first approach, the delayed rejection algorithm, the pinball sampler, the Metropolis adjusted Langevin algorithm, and the hybrid version of the population Monte Carlo (PMC) algorithm are selected as a set of examples of hybrid algorithms. Statistical literature shows how statistical efficiency is often the only criteria for an efficient algorithm. In this thesis the algorithms are also considered and compared from a more practical perspective. This extends to the study of how individual algorithms contribute to the overall efficiency of hybrid algorithms, and highlights weaknesses that may be introduced by the combination process of these components in a single algorithm. The second approach to considering computational aspects of hybrid algorithms involves an investigation of the performance of the PMC in high dimensions. It is well known that as a model becomes more complex, computation may become increasingly difficult in real time. In particular the importance sampling based algorithms, including the PMC, are known to be unstable in high dimensions. This thesis examines the PMC algorithm in a simplified setting, a single step of the general sampling, and explores a fundamental problem that occurs in applying importance sampling to a high-dimensional problem. The precision of the computed estimate from the simplified setting is measured by the asymptotic variance of the estimate under conditions on the importance function. Additionally, the exponential growth of the asymptotic variance with the dimension is demonstrated and we illustrates that the optimal covariance matrix for the importance function can be estimated in a special case.

A cybernetic approach to land management issues

This work is a digital version of a dissertation that was first submitted in partial fulfillment of the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy at the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) in March 1994. The work was concerned with problems of self-organisation and organisation ranging from local to global levels of hierarchy. It considers organisations as living entities from local to global things that a living entity – more particularly, an individual, a body corporate or a body politic - must know and do to maintain an existence – that is to remain viable – or to be sustainable. The term ‘land management’ as used in 1994 was later subsumed into a more general concept of ‘natural resource management’ and then merged with ideas about sustainable socioeconomic and sustainable ecological development. The cybernetic approach contains many cognitive elements of human observation, language and learning that combine into production processes. The approach tends to highlight instances where systems (or organisations) can fail because they have very little chance of succeeding. Thus there are logical necessities as well as technical possibilities in designing, constructing, operating and maintaining production systems that function reliably over extended periods. Chapter numbers and titles to the original thesis are as follows: 1. Land management as a problem of coping with complexity 2. Background theory in systems theory and cybernetic principles 3. Operationalisation of cybernetic principles in Beer’s Viable System Model 4. Issues in the design of viable cadastral surveying and mapping organisation 5. An analysis of the tendency for fragmentation in surveying and mapping organisation 6. Perambulating the boundaries of Sydney – a problem of social control under poor standards of literacy 7. Cybernetic principles in the process of legislation 8. Closer settlement policy and viability in agricultural production 9. Rate of return in leasing Crown lands