Assessment of transport quality of life as an alternative transport appraisal technique

In the United Kingdom the New Approach to Transport Appraisal (NATA) is used to appraise the economic, environmental and social impacts of transport projects. This analytical tool has recently been updated, but still fails to fully evaluate individual’s experiences of transport. It is important to understand more about passengers current journey quality for an informed judgement on the impact of future schemes. This paper presents findings of a methodological tool that can appraise Transport quality of life (TQoL) on all modes of transport in one city. Quality of life (QoL) techniques were applied to the transport networks of Glasgow and Manchester to determine if this is a valuable alternative in transport appraisal. Effective assessment confirmed the validity of the method highlighting in both locations that fixed modes, particularly Light Rapid Transport, are providing a significantly better quality of life compared to the bus.     

综合运输通道内旅客运输方式替代性分析

为了定量分析区域综合运输通道内旅客运输方式的替代性,从运输产品的经济性、快速性、方便性、安全性、舒适性5个特性入手,利用集对分析原理建立替代性模型,按照效益型产品特性和成本型产品特性,经过多因素综合处理后,将联系度转化为替代度,分别表示运输方式间可替代程度、不可替代程度和不能确定程度。最后,通过算例分析模型的应用。     

基于SDH的MSTP中的数据交换芯片设计

针对在SDH上构建多业务传输平台(MSTP)的需求,介绍了一种能在SDH传输和接入设备中提供灵活的数据业务支持的PoS(PacketoverSDH)数据交换芯片的设计方法。该芯片基于共享存储器的交换结构,采用了先进的流水线设计方式以提高整体交换容量。芯片支持服务质量保证(QoS)和组播(Multicast)功能,可用于SDH传输和接入设备中,为SDH上的数据业务支持提供简单而高效的解决方案。     

Demand responsive transport: towards the emergence of a new market segment

This paper focuses on recent British experience with telematics-based Demand Responsive Transport (DRT) services in rural areas. In recent years, the ability of DRT concepts to provide efficient, viable transport services has been greatly enhanced by the use of transport telematics as demonstrated in a variety of environments across Europe. The success of British local authorities in winning substantial funding under the Rural and Urban Bus Challenge programmes for the implementation of DRT has resulted in widespread interest in flexible forms of transport. It is thus timely to evaluate the impact of this substantial investment. Drawing on the experience of a number of UK schemes, the paper assesses the reasons for the new-found success of what is becoming a relatively well-accepted mode by concentrating on a variety of factors including: service characteristics (particularly route flexibility, flexibility of booking method and pre-booking regime), emerging markets and the overall contribution of DRT to increased social inclusion and intermodality. Impediments to the development of DRT services are highlighted. The paper also discusses current research into the next generation of DRT services and concludes by identifying some key issues for policy-makers concerned with the future implementation of DRT services.     

Spatial welfare economics versus ecological footprint: modeling agglomeration,externalities and trade

A welfare framework for the analysis of the spatial dimensions of sustainability is developed. It covers agglomeration effects, interregional trade, negative environmental externalities, and various land use categories. The model is used to compare rankings of spatial configurations according to evaluations based on social welfare and ecological footprint indicators. Five spatial configurations are considered for this purpose. The exercise is operationalized with the help of a two-region model of the economy, that is, in line with the ‘new economic geography.’ By generating a number of numerical ‘counter-examples,’ it is shown that the footprint method is inconsistent with an approach aimed at maximum social welfare. Unless environmental externalities are such a large problem that they overwhelm all other components of economic well-being, a ‘spatial welfare economic’ approach delivers totally different rankings of alternative land use configurations than the ecological footprint.      

Developing land use and transport PSS: Meaningful information through a dialogue between modelers and planners

One of the key barriers to integration of land use and transport planning is the lack of a “common language” (i.e. tools, instruments, indicators) that can support planners from both domains in developing shared visions and integrated strategies. Many of such tools and indicators have been developed in recent years, but not so many are implemented in practice. In this paper a new, participatory development approach for planning support systems (PSS) is proposed, termed “mediated planning support” (MPS) that addresses bottlenecks blocking this implementation. It is founded on insights from knowledge management, system dynamics and software innovation and is applied in the Greater Region of Amsterdam. This paper discusses the evolution of the PSS, highlighting the most useful elements which can be applied in other land use and transport planning projects. It offers insights for practitioners and researchers interested in land use and transport planning integration and for professionals that are dealing with supporting planning with information and technologies.     

Transport infrastructure equities in mixed-asset portfolios: estimating risk with a Garch-Copula CVaR model

Transport infrastructure is an important subsector within infrastructure, but knowledge of its equities in terms of risk-return characteristics and contribution to portfolio performance is still limited. This study assesses the subsector individually and in a multi-asset, index-based portfolio. In doing so, we apply a t-Copula-based Conditional Value-at-Risk model to simulate risk and returns. Our findings reveal that the subsector has a relatively low dependency on other equities, performs like other alternative asset classes such as general real estate, and does not grant significant risk diversification benefits for mainstream institutional investors such as pension funds. Investors aiming for higher target returns may however assign substantial weights to transport infrastructure, supporting our conjecture that it does not share the same asset class characteristics as general infrastructure. By contrasting Value-at-Risk (VaR) and Conditional Value-at-Risk (CVaR) scores for both the mean-variance framework and the t-Copula simulation, we further document the limitations of traditional VaR approaches. Hence, this study’s results support the use of risk assessment tools that incorporate non-normal distributions to represent multivariate dependence structures.     

Fuel for inequality: Distributional effects of environmental reforms on private transport

This paper provides the first empirical evidence of the distributional effects of subsidies for the purchase of alternative vehicles based on an extended version of Hausman's exact consumer surplus. In consistence with economic theory, we estimate changes in household welfare, inequality, and social welfare resulting from different reforms. First, we find that an additional tax on conventional fuel is regressive. However, returning the additional tax revenue via lump-sum transfers can alleviate this effect. Second, when the additional revenue is also used to finance subsidies for electrical and compressed natural gas (CNG) vehicles, households that own such vehicles experience welfare gains. However, this policy also increases income inequality and decreases social welfare.     

Testing the transport-induced environmental Kuznets curve hypothesis: The role of air and railway transport

The airline and railway industry contribute immensely to economic development, however, its role in environmental pollution requires attention. Here, this study builds on the theoretical pedigree of the environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) hypothesis to explore the contribution of the air and railway transportation sector and urbanization to the emission-growth argument. We utilized annual time-frequency data from 1995 to 2014 for a panel of top 10 air passenger carrier countries using robust panel estimators that control for cross-section dependence. The empirical analysis shows a positive significant relationship between emissions and economic growth, thus, economic growth is emission-embedded with limited green growth. The existence of the EKC phenomenon is affirmed for the investigated blocs — where economic growth is prioritized over environmental quality. Additional, while air transportation drives pollution, railway transportation and urbanization decline emission over the sampled period. The results underscore the need for clean and environmentally friendly energy sources for air sector operations.     

How to reduce energy intensity to achieve sustainable development of China's transport sector? A cross-regional comparison analysis

China's transport sector has been attracting great attention for its excessive energy consumption and ever-increasing pollution emissions. Thus, reducing energy intensity is one of the top priorities of China's ongoing transport upgrade. In this paper, by establishing a panel data regression model derived from the Cobb–Douglas cost function, we focus on investigating the impacts of energy price and transport productivity on transport energy intensity at the national and regional levels. The study uses the provincial panel data for 2005–2016 to perform regression analysis. The results show that: (1) energy price has a significantly negative effect on transport energy intensity in the whole China and the eastern region, whereas it has no significant impacts in the central and western China. (2) Improvements in transport productivity can effectively decrease transport energy intensity in the whole China and the three major regions. (3) Applying an extended data envelopment analysis (DEA) approach, we decompose transport productivity into four components (i.e., technical change, technology gap change, scale efficiency change, and pure efficiency change) and further differentiate their impacts in different regions. The results indicate that these four components have substantially different impacts in each region. These results provide some valuable insights for policymakers and enterprise entities aiming to adopt measures to reduce energy intensity and achieve sustainable development in China's transport sector.