Towards a meta-analysis and toolkit for port-related socio-economic impacts: a review of socio-economic impact studies conducted for seaports

Port authorities increasingly need to communicate with a variety of external stakeholders in order to maintain and strengthen the societal acceptance of seaport activities. The availability of socio-economic impact studies on port authority and regional development agency websites has often made this information accessible to the public at large. However, the differences in methodologies adopted, in terms of selecting, defining and measuring various types of socio-economic impacts, sometimes lead to misconceptions as well as misleading comparisons across ports within and between regions. In this paper, we suggest guidelines for the design and application of a potential best practice from an interregional perspective (UK, France and Belgium), based on research in the framework of a European Commission co-funded project, ‘IMPACTE’. The paper also aims to develop guidelines for comparing the socio-economic impacts of ports across regional and national borders and discusses the development of a European port economic impact measurement toolkit. We analyse a sample of 33 recent socio-economic impact assessment reports in terms of methodologies adopted and types of impacts measured. The review shows a great diversity among these studies, leading to important differences between the impacts of port activity communicated to stakeholders.     

A hybrid controller for autonomous vehicles driving on automated highways

This paper addresses the problem of the hybrid control of autonomous vehicles driving on automated highways. Vehicles are autonomous, so they do not communicate with each other nor with the infrastructure. Two problems have to be dealt with: a vehicle driving in a single-lane highway must never collide with its leading vehicle; and a vehicle entering the highway at a designated entry junction must be able to merge from the merging lane to the main lane, again without any collision. To solve these problems, we equip each vehicle with a hybrid controller, consisting of several continuous control laws embedded inside a finite state automaton. The automaton specifies when a given vehicle must enter the highway, merge into the main lane, yield to other vehicles, exit from the highway, and so on. The continuous control laws specify what acceleration the vehicle must have in order to avoid collisions with nearby vehicles. By carefully designing these control laws and the conditions guarding the automaton transitions, we are able to demonstrate three important results. First, we state the initial conditions guaranteeing that a following vehicle never collides with its leading vehicle. Second, we extend this first result to a lane of autonomous vehicles. Third, we prove that if all the vehicles are equipped with our hybrid controller, then no collision can ever occur, and all vehicles either merge successfully or are forced to drop out when they reach the end of their merging lane. Finally, we show the outcome of a highway microsimulation modelled after the Katy Corridor near Houston, Texas: our single-lane highway can accommodate 4000 vehicles per hour with neither drop-outs nor traffic congestion. It is entirely programmed in SHIFT, a hybrid systems simulation language developed at UC Berkeley by the PATH group. This shows that SHIFT is a well suited language for designing safe control laws for autonomous highway systems, among others.     

KERFIX, a time-series station in the Southern Ocean: a presentation

Between January 1990 and March 1995, the research project KERFIX undertook the first regular noncoastal multiyear acquisition of parameters related to the carbon cycle in the Southern Ocean at a time series station located at 50°40′ S–68°25′ E, 60 miles southwest of the Kerguelen Islands. The objectives of KERFIX are (1) to monitor the ocean/atmosphere CO₂ and O₂ exchanges and to understand which processes govern these exchanges (2) to observe and interpret the seasonal and interannual variability of the production, flux, decomposition and dissolution of carbon and associated elements at this location. In addition, micropaleontological studies describe the present and past flux dynamics in this oceanic area, to improve the knowledge of the transfer functions of some oceanographic proxies. This paper presents a survey of the KERFIX program: scientific objectives, organization of the field operations and some main results obtained since the beginning of KERFIX program, as well as the results of the temporal evolution of hydrological, chemical and biological parameters.     

Distributions of oxygen and carbon stable isotopes and CFC-12 in the water masses of the Southern Ocean at 30°E from South Africa to Antarctica: results of the CIVA1 cruise

This study presents oceanic distributions of stable isotopes (δ¹⁸O of water and δ¹³C of ΣCO₂) and CFC-12 from samples collected during the CIVA1 cruise (February/March 1993), across the Southern Ocean, along a meridian section at 30°E, from South Africa (44°S) to Antarctica (70°S). The isotopic measurements show important variations between the subantarctic surface waters with low δ¹⁸O–high δ¹³C values and the antarctic surface waters with very low δ¹⁸O–low δ¹³C values. The surface distributions of δ¹³C values follow the major frontal oceanic structures; the vertical distribution shows the progressive upwelling from the subantarctic zone to the antarctic divergence of ¹³C-depleted CO₂ derived from remineralization of organic matter. Along the Antarctic continental shelf, between 2500 and 4000 m, a core of water with δ¹⁸O values close to −0.1‰ is associated with a relative maximum in CFC-12 concentration, although this core is not detected by its temperature and salinity parameters. This water mass, which corresponds to recently formed deep water, may originate from the eastward extension of the Weddell gyre or from bottom waters coming from the East and formed near Prydz Bay.     

卢森堡的有轨电车--一个旧时代的结束和新时代的开始

由于私人轿车和公共汽车的灵活和方便,建立在城市铁路和地区窄轨铁路的基础上、一度被人引以自豪的有轨电车运输网络日益衰落.1964年起,有轨电车从卢森堡街头消失了.90年代初期,一些理想主义者联合起来,建立了"Tramasbl"协会,其目的是在公国首都重新引入有轨交通.1992年,维也纳大学以Knoflacher教授为首的研究所得出结论:如果卢森堡的轻轨交通(LRT)系统的服务能够覆盖郊区,就将变得非常有意义.这重新引发了围绕城市有轨电车网络的争论.     

性感毒蛇——Iroc Sports Car Concept

曾于33年前在日内瓦国际车展上展出，大众紧凑型双门跑车Scirocco强烈吸引了人们的目光。随后，它在市场上的表现同样不俗，第一代车型销售量超过50万辆，在2006年这家欧洲最大的汽车公司重新演绎了Scirocco的精神，这就是最近在柏林登场的Iroc运动概念车。     

GO SPORTS——MINI Concept Detroit

2006年是Mini的创造者Alec Issigonis爵士诞辰100周年。借此．已经归属于宝马集团的Mini在北美国际车展上以底特律为名推出了一款概念车，它以“Go Sportsl”为口号，在21世纪初对源自英国的经典Mini Traveller进行了重新诠释。     

纯暴力登场 Jeep Wrangler

号称是全球最强悍的越野车，克莱斯勒全新的2007吉普牧马人冲破牢笼，正式亮相于北美国际汽车展览会的舞台上。几秒钟后这辆传奇的美国车离开了这个盛会：它走下舞台，先穿过车辆展示区来到底特律Cobo中心的大厅，在这里吉普牧马人像绅士一般给一位女士让路。但接着，它猛然撞破前门玻璃冲了出去，在爬下Cobo中心的楼梯后，牧马人抖落身上的玻璃碎片，行进在华盛顿大道（Washington VENUE）上。     

GTI家族新丁——Volkswagen Polo GTI

GTI是汽车界著名的标签之一，它代表着高速、敏捷和运动安全性。大众公司推出的全新波罗GTI当然也不例外。它的极速可以达到216km/h，0～10Okm/h加速在8.2s以内。是30年以来最强劲波罗。