AN APPROACH TO THE ECONOMIC APPRAISAL OF AVCS MAGLEV

The purpose of an economic appraisal of a transportation project is to help select an efficient transportation investment plan. Here, efficiency means achieving the best transportation service from a given investment and the generation of net benefits at least as great as the costs of the investment. In this article, three future transportation investment alternatives in the USA are compared using the benefit-cost ratio method to illustrate the economic desirability of the AVCS Maglev alternative – an advanced vehicle control system based on magnetic levitation and propulsion. For the completeness of the economic appraisal and the provision of a guide to performing non-user benefit analysis for this promising ITS technology, the socioeconomic effects of implementing AVCS Maglev in the USA are evaluated based on the US National Development Model (NDM).     

桥梁水毁研究综述

近年来,桥梁水毁日益频发,已成为桥梁倒塌失效的首要因素。从冲刷、洪水2类最主要的水文因素出发,充分结合历史数据,分析并对比其对桥梁水毁的影响程度与规律;并按2类水文因素所对应的不同桥梁倒塌失效模式,对桥梁水毁现有的研究工作和方法进行总结归纳;最后,聚焦实桥应用,对现有桥梁水毁监测和诊治手段进行全面梳理。综述可得以下结论：①冲刷是导致桥梁水毁的最主要因素,所致失效桥型以桁架桥、梁桥、拱桥为主,桥梁服役时间、结构安全状态、年平均径流量均与桥梁所受冲刷程度存在较强相关性;②冲刷坑空间形态数值仿真与试验结果仍有一定差距,其泥沙模型缺少考虑床沙级配的影响,经验公式法尚需突破计算维度的局限性,完善考虑时间因素和黏性土的冲刷深度预测;③现阶段洪水波流竖向升力计算公式较少考虑脉动压力,浪荷载水槽试验尚未完全探明波浪特性与作用力间的联系,桥梁可靠度研究多见以冲刷为主的多灾害下联合效应计算,仍缺少波流、浪力作用与地震动水作用等其他灾害联合作用的深入探讨;④桥梁抗水目前仍局限于流场与结构域的独立研究,未见不同水文因素下基于结构域-流场多场耦合的桥梁失效模式分析;⑤雷达、声波以及潜水员水下检测是现阶段桥梁冲刷主流监测方式,桥梁冲刷动力识别适用于复杂环境下大规模、区域性桥梁检测,但仍有待进一步的应用研究,而既有桥梁水毁诊治手段在具体实施时需因地制宜,避免反而加剧水文病害。     

Counting people in the crowd using social media images for crowd management in city events

Transportation - City events are getting popular and are attracting a large number of people. This increase needs for methods and tools to provide stakeholders with crowd size information for crowd...     

Research developments in numerical methods of fluid-structure interactions in naval architecture and ocean engineering北大核心CSCD

流固耦合问题较为复杂,通常难以通过理论推导求得,而数值模拟则能提供一种有效的解决方案,并被广泛用于船舶与海洋工程领域。流固耦合数值方法根据其网格离散方式,可以分为贴体网格方法、非贴体网格方法、重叠网格方法和粒子类方法 4类,对这4类方法的特点及研究进展进行概述并总结得出:贴体网格方法和重叠网格方法均能精确捕捉界面的变形和演化,适合高雷诺数流动问题,在考虑结构变形时一般采用贴体网格方法,而考虑复杂几何形状的刚体运动时则常采用重叠网格方法;非贴体网格方法能够避免网格的更新操作,使计算较为简单,目前多用于模拟流动控制、水下柔性仿生航行器的研发以及多体运动干扰等问题;粒子类方法因其固有的拉格朗日属性,在模拟涉及自由液面剧烈变形、砰击、爆炸等强非线性流固耦合问题中发挥着重要作用。不同的流固耦合问题属性决定了不同方法的适用性,如何选取适合的数值方法,同时结合各类方法的优势开发新的计算方法以应对更为复杂的问题,是流固耦合算法开发的重要发展方向。     

软弱地层浅埋大跨隧道跳仓法拆撑空间效应研究北大核心CSCD

对于在软弱、破碎、富水地层中采用双侧壁导坑法修筑的暗挖大跨隧道,跳仓法施工依赖于初期支护的“棚护效应”维持拆撑后大跨结构的稳定性,常常面临拆撑步距小、风险高、效率低、代价大的困境,一旦拆撑方案采取不当,极易造成塌方安全事故。针对这一问题,以青岛地铁4号线错埠岭站为依托工程,通过理论分析与数值计算相结合的手段,论证了拆撑后初期支护“空间棚护效应”主要由“横向成拱效应”和“纵向成梁效应”组成,二者共同维持大跨结构的安全性与稳定性;同时确定了合理、安全、高效、快速的拆撑分区长度与隔仓分区长度,分别为L=9 m、S=18 m,并顺利通过了现场施工的检验。结果表明:软弱地层大跨隧道采用“隔二拆一、先内部后洞口”的拆撑方案是切实可行的,可为后续工程提供借鉴与指导。     

Platooning for sustainable freight transportation: an adoptable practice in the near future?

ABSTRACT

Platooning is an emerging transportation practice that has the potential to solve the problems of the burgeoning transportation industry. A platoon is a group of vehicles, with vehicle to vehicle communication, that travel closely behind one another such that the platoon can accelerate, brake and cruise together. Platoons can improve road safety, be energy efficient and reduce costs. Its complete socio-economic benefits include congestion mitigation, smoother traffic flow, better lane usage and throughput, incentives for green logistics and driver safety. The long-term effect of platooning on road transportation, if extensively deployed, would be better organised traffic flow and efficient tracking of vehicles on the road ushering a multilevel positive impact on the industry. In this study, we attempt to answer the critical question of whether platooning is an adoptable practice in the near future and discuss an agenda to take platooning closer to implementation on the ground by highlighting the opportunities for future research. We also present a conceptual framework to help researchers, academicians, policy makers and practitioners for the adoption of platooning into the transportation industry.     

基于软计算的低于数据范围的半圆形防波堤波浪反射预报（英文）

Coastal defenses such as the breakwaters are important structures to maintain the navigation conditions in a harbor. The estimation of their hydrodynamic characteristics is conventionally done using physical models, subjecting to higher costs and prolonged procedures. Soft computing methods prove to be useful tools, in cases where the data availability from physical models is limited. The present paper employs adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference system(ANFIS) and artificial neural network(ANN) models to the data obtained from physical model studies to develop a novel methodology to predict the reflection coefficient(K_r) of seaside perforated semicircular breakwaters under low wave heights, for which no physical model data is available. The prediction was done using the input parameters viz., incident wave height(Hi), wave period(T), center-to-center spacing of perforations(S), diameter of perforations(D), radius of semicircular caisson(R), water depth(d), and semicircular breakwater structure height(h_s). The study shows the prediction below the available data range of wave heights is possible by ANFIS and ANN models. However, the ANFIS performed better with R~2= 0.9775 and the error reduced in comparison with the ANN model with R~2= 0.9751. Study includes conventional data segregation and prediction using ANN and ANFIS.     

The impact of ship size on ports’ nautical costs

ABSTRACT

Much is known about transport costs at sea and costs made at terminals in ports. About costs, made by ports to provide nautical facilities (incl. infrastructure) and services, not much research is done yet. This paper estimates the impact of increasing ship sizes on costs made by the Port Authority of Amsterdam when providing nautical facilities and services by using hedonic pricing techniques. We have rather unique data on ship’s sizes and harbour dues paid per ship for over 25 years for ships that visited the Port of Amsterdam. Harbour dues paid are used as a proxy for the costs of nautical facilities and services. We have found nearly constant returns to scale, when volume is used as a measure of a ships’ size. An increase in average ship size with 1,000 tonnes deadweight will result in approximately €2 million additional yearly costs (an increase of the average ship size of six percent results in an increase of nautical costs with nearly the same percentage). Our results can be used by Port Authorities and port operators (in case of landlord ports) to estimate costs to be made for providing nautical facilities and services in the near future.     

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行程时间的不确定性是影响货运车队路径选择的一个重要因素，特别是对于要求货物准时送达的配送任务（例如商品混凝土的配送），提出了在车辆调度中考虑由拥挤路段交通流量波动引起的行程时间不确定性的方法，建立了考虑行程时间可靠性要求的车辆优化调度数学模型，给出了相应的启发式算法，通过算例介绍了该模型和算法的应用。结果表明配送总成本随行程时间可靠性要求的提高而增加。     

Transaction Costs in Transport Public–Private Partnerships: Comparing Procurement Procedures

Abstract

In recent years, concern has grown over good practices in the procurement process in public–private partnerships (PPPs). The consensus view is that PPPs are prone to higher transaction costs than traditional public provision. In this paper, we contrast the hypothesis that transaction costs in transport PPPs depend, to a large extent, on the procurement mechanism used in each case, comparing the Negotiated and the Open procedures. Given that PPPs may offer considerable benefits and significant savings over the entire life cycle of the project, it is essential for PPPs to minimize those costs that undermine efficiency gains and that deter private involvement. The quantitative analysis undertaken in this paper highlights that there is room for important savings in the tendering of PPP transport infrastructure projects, using an Open procedure.