Infrastructure Finance and Industrial Takeoff in England

That financial matters did not constrain industrial takeoff in the UK is generally accepted in the historical literature; in contrast, contemporary empirical analyses have found evidence that financial development can be a causal determinant of economic growth. We look to reconcile these findings by concentrating on a particular aspect of industrialising UK where inefficiencies in finance could have had bite: The finance of physical infrastructures. We document the historical record and develop the importance of spatial disaggregation and spillovers in both technological and financial development. We develop a simple model that captures the nature of infrastructure finance within a theory of endogenous growth where financial costs are endogenous. We argue that the conception of the finance-growth nexus as a largely static, aggregative phenomenon misses out a good deal of complexity and we relate that complexity to a number of implications for regulation of both financial systems and the emergence of infrastructures

Economic Principles and Determination of Infrastructure Third Party Tariffs in the UK Continental Shelf (UKCS)

NORTH SEA STUDY OCCASIONAL PAPER No. 116

Prospective Decommissioning Activity and Infrastructure Availability in the UKCS

NORTH SEA STUDY OCCASIONAL PAPER No. 122

Inter-regional redistribution through infrastructure investment: tactical or programmatic?

In this paper we analyze the effects of both tactical and programmatic politics on the inter-regional allocation of infrastructure investment. We use a panel of data for the Spanish electoral districts during the period 1964-2004 to estimate an equation where investment depends both on economic and political variables. The results show that tactical politics do matter since, after controlling for economic traits, the districts with more ‘Political power’ still receive more investment. These districts are those where the incumbents’ Vote margin of victory/ defeat in the past election is low, where the Marginal seat price is low, where there is Partisan alignment between the executives at the central and regional layers of government, and where there are Pivotal regional parties which are influential in the formation of the central executive. However, the results also show that programmatic politics matter, since inter-regional redistribution (measured as the elasticity of investment to per capita income) is shown to increase with the arrival of the Democracy and EU Funds, with Left governments, and to decrease the higher is the correlation between a measure of ‘Political power’ and per capita income.

The Accessibility City. When Transport Infrastructure Matters in Urban Spatial Structure

Suburbanization is changing the urban spatial structure and less monocentric metropolitan regions are becoming the new urban reality. Focused only on centers, most works have studied these spatial changes neglecting the role of transport infrastructure and its related location model, the “accessibility city”, in which employment and population concentrate in low-density settlements and close to transport infrastructure. For the case of Barcelona, we consider this location model and study the population spatial structure between 1991 and 2006. The results reveal a mix between polycentricity and the accessibility city, with movements away from the main centers, but close to the transport infrastructure.

Is it redistribution or centralization? On the determinants of government investment in infrastructure

The dilemma efficiency versus equity, together with political partisan interests, has received increasing attention to explain the territorial allocation of investments. However, centralization intended to introduce or reinforce hierarchization in the political system has not been object as of now of empirical analysis. Our main contribution to the literature is providing evidence that meta-political objectives related to the ordering of political power and administration influence regional investment. In this way, we find evidence that network mode’s (roads and railways) investment programs are influenced by the centralization strategy of investing near to the political capital, while investment effort in no-network modes (airports and ports) appears to be positively related to distance. Since investment in surface transportation infrastructures is much higher than that in airports and ports, and taken into account that regions surrounding the political capital are poorer than the average, we suggest that centralization rather than redistribution has been the driver for the concentration of public investment on these regions.

Scheduling in virtual infrastructure

For the execution of the scientific applications, different methods have been proposed to dynamically provide execution environments for such applications that hide the complexity of underlying distributed and heterogeneous infrastructures. Recently virtualization has emerged as a promising technology to provide such environments. Virtualization is a technology that abstracts away the details of physical hardware and provides virtualized resources for high-level scientific applications. Virtualization offers a cost-effective and flexible way to use and manage computing resources. Such an abstraction is appealing in Grid computing and Cloud computing for better matching jobs (applications) to computational resources. This work applies the virtualization concept to the Condor dynamic resource management system by using Condor Virtual Universe to harvest the existing virtual computing resources to their maximum utility. It allows existing computing resources to be dynamically provisioned at run-time by users based on application requirements instead of statically at design-time thereby lay the basis for efficient use of the available resources, thus providing way for the efficient use of the available resources.

Proposition d'un concept de contrôle de gestion pour la division "infrastructure routière" de l'Office fédéral des routes (OFROU)

La présente étude propose une méthodologie aboutissant à la conception d'un système de contrôle de gestion pour la division « infrastructure routière » ou « I » de l'Office fédéral des routes (OFROU). La première partie de ce travail situe l'OFROU dans son contexte de réformes et identifie les raisons qui justifient l'implantation d'un système de contrôle de gestion à l'OFROU. La deuxième partie pose les jalons permettant d'établir un contrôle de gestion dans sa division « I ». Elle cherche d'abord à donner une définition du contrôle de gestion dans le secteur public, puis présente un état des lieux du système de gestion existant. Finalement, les systèmes de contrôle de gestion de deux autres offices GMEB, MétéoSuisse et armasuisse immobilier, sont analysés afin d'en tirer des éléments pertinents pouvant servir à la conception du contrôle de gestion à l'OFROU. La troisième propose un contrôle de gestion pour la division « I ». Le travail montre que la réalisation d'un concept de contrôle de gestion pour la division « I » n'est pas évidente. Cette dernière, qui est en train de se mettre en place, manque encore d'expérience pour identifier clairement les éléments clé à insérer dans le système. On observe un grand embarras entre le stade du savoir et celui du savoir faire concret. La méthodologie et l'analyse présentées dans ce travail pourraient contribuer à développer un savoir faire interne aboutissant rapidement à la mise sur pied d'un système de contrôle de gestion pour la division « I ». Die vorliegende Studie schlägt eine Methodik zur Erarbeitung eines Management-Kontrollsystems für die Abteilung « Strasseninfrastruktur » oder « I » des Bundesamts für Strassen (ASTRA) vor. Der erste Teil dieser Arbeit stellt das ASTRA im Spannungsfeld dieser Reformen. Ihre Konsequenzen lassen die Einführung eines Management-Kontrollsystems im ASTRA folgerichtig erscheinen. Im zweiten Teil geht es darum, Wegmarken zu setzen, die die Einführung einer Managementkontrolle in der Abteilung « I » in die richtigen Bahnen lenken. Es wird versucht, eine Begriffsbestimmung der Managementkontrolle im öffentlichen Sektor sowie eine Bestandesaufnahme der bestehenden Systeme vorzunehmen. Schliesslich werden die Management-Kontrollsysteme zweier anderer FLAG-Ämter, MeteoSchweiz und armasuisse immobilier, auf mögliche Nutzen für den Aufbau der Managementkontrolle des ASTRA analysiert. Der dritte Teil beinhaltet einen Vorschlag, wie die Management-Kontrolle für die Abteilung « I » aussehen könnte. Die Arbeit zeigt, dass die Erarbeitung eines Management-Kontrollkonzepts für die Abteilung « I » keine einfache Aufgabe ist. Es fehlt an Erfahrung, um die Schlüsselbausteine des Systems erkennen zu können. Zwischen dem Stadium des Wissens und dem des konkreten Know-hows klafft ein empfindlicher Graben. Methodik und Analyse, wie sie in der vorliegenden Arbeit beschrieben werden, könnten zum Aufbau eines internen Know-hows beitragen, das die rasche Verwirklichung eines Management-Kontrollsystems für die Abteilung « I » erlauben könnte.

Circulation of hantaviruses in the influence area of the Cuiabá-Santarém Highway

We describe evidence of circulation of hantaviruses in the influence area of the Santarém-Cuiabá Highway (BR-163) in the Brazilian Amazon through the prevalence of specific antibodies against hantaviruses in inhabitants living in four municipalities of this area: Novo Progresso (2.16%) and Trairão (4.37%), in state of Pará (PA), and Gua-rantã do Norte (4.74%) and Marcelândia (9.43%), in state of Mato Grosso. We also demonstrate the ongoing association between Castelo dos Sonhos virus (CASV) and hantavirus pulmonary syndrome (HPS) cases in the Castelo dos Sonhos district (municipality of Altamira, PA) and the first report of CASV in the municipalities of Novo Progresso and Guarantã do Norte. The results of this work highlight the risk for a possible increase in the number of HPS cases and the emergence of new hantavirus lineages associated with deforestation in this Amazonian area after the conclusion of paving works on BR-163 Highway.

2004 Highway Accomplishment Program, July 1, 2003 to June 30, 2004

Future plans for funding for Iowa Department of Transportation Report

Annual Report of Highway Division Highway Research and Development in Iowa, 2003

Annual report for Iowa Department of Transportation.

Iowa Problem Indentification for Federal 402 State and Community Highway Safety Programs, Iowa Department of Public Safety, January, 2002

The major objective of this problem identification document is the determination of the relative severity of traffic safety problems in each of the 99 counties. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and the Iowa Governor's Traffic Safety Bureau are committed to the reduction of death and injury on the nation's roads. As part of its duty in administering federal traffic safety funds in the State of Iowa, the Governor's Traffic Safety Bureau conducts a comprehensive Problem Identification update each year.