The development of public attitudes towards the Stockholm congestion trial

A full-scale congestion charging trial was carried out in Stockholm the first months of 2006. Almost half of respondents in a county-wide survey stated that they changed their attitudes towards congestion charges during the trial. Most of them became more positive.An analysis of media shows that the attitudinal change in media towards the trial coincides with the attitudinal change of the public. There was no dramatic change in the proportion of articles expressing a negative view. Instead, the result indicates that the increase in positive views was driven by a shift from neutral to positive articles during the trial.In order to ascertain why the public attitudes swung, we have analysed the anticipated and perceived effects of the trial. Generally, the analysis seems to indicate that improved understanding of the type and magnitude of concrete effects was not a main driving force behind the attitudinal change. Instead, it seems that the public attitude changed because personal experience gave a new understanding of the implications of the charges for the personal well-being. This would imply that trials, generally, may be a more useful tool than information in the process of implementing ‘difficult’ policy measures, such as congestion charges.     

斯德哥尔摩的拥挤收费政策——政策实施5年后的效果、接受度及经验启示

根据2006年拥挤收费政策试运行结束后的公民投票结果,2007年,斯德哥尔摩正式实施了该政策。讨论了其至2011年6月首个5年内的政策实施效果。结果表明,受到外部因素影响,由收费引起的交通减少量随时间推移稍有增加。2008年的清洁汽车免税措施可显著提高销售量。结合最新研究成果和瑞典的经验,讨论了公众接受度和政治接受度。得到的结论是：拥挤收费对交通系统的主客观影响,以及环境和政治态度,是公众支持拥挤收费的基础;同时,为了获得政治支持,必须要进行体制改革、解决权力问题。最后,简要讨论了拥挤收费的实施对瑞典交通规划进程的可能影响。     

Determinants affecting ferry users’ waiting time at ferry terminals

Transportation - The paper develops a model to examine how different factors influence ferry users’ waiting time at the terminals. The estimations are based on interviews of 10,952 Norwegian...     

Waiting time and the role and value of information in scheduled transport

A new logit-based model for assigning public transit passengers to transit lines or routes is proposed. The model is based on the realistic assumption that once passengers arrive at stops, they can obtain information regarding the specific departure times. Furthermore, it takes into account that passengers are heterogeneous and hence, the choice made by a ‘representative’ passenger appears to be stochastic. The model is evaluated by means of simulations.     

A “horizontal Sverdrup mechanism” may control the spring bloom around small oceanic islands and over banks

One of the most basic paradigms in marine ecology is the “Sverdrup mechanism,” where the spring bloom is retarded if the surface mixed layer is too deep, due to the algae being mixed vertically out of the euphotic layer. A similar mechanism may operate in vertically homogeneous water over a small shallow area, surrounded by deep waters, if the horizontal exchange is sufficiently intense. In systems with inter-annual variations in the horizontal exchange rate, this may induce inter-annual variations in the timing and intensity of the spring bloom. A numerical primary production model with circular symmetry and prescribed horizontal exchange rate is developed. Using the Faroe Shelf as an example, the model and observations show that the timing and intensity of the spring bloom in the shallow parts of the system may be critically dependent upon the rate of the horizontal exchange. Numerical experiments confirm that the effect of horizontal exchange on the spring bloom is less pronounced for banks than for shelf systems around islands of similar scales, and that the effect increases in importance as the horizontal scale is reduced.     

Ventilation of bottom water in the North Sea–Baltic Sea transition zone

The transition zone between the North Sea and the Baltic Sea is a highly dynamic region where a general estuarine circulation forms a regional scale frontal system from northern Kattegat to the Arkona Sea. This system is characterized by an upper low saline out?owing Baltic water mass from the in?owing saline Skagerrak bottom water to the Kattegat and Belt Sea area. Large and rapid ?uctuations of the frontal system are caused by barotropic transports, forced by changing sea level difference between northern Kattegat and the western Baltic Sea, and this results in high variability of the hydrographic conditions and also in frequent in- and out?ow events to the Baltic. The dynamics in the region are here analyzed by a regional model of the transition zone, covering the area from the northern Kattegat to the Arkona Sea. The model is validated against water level, temperature and salinity measurements from the region, and the transports through the Danish straits are related to previous estimates and empirical relations. A sensitivity study quantify the role of bathymetry, the tidally induced mixing and the in?owing Skagerrak bottom water for ventilating the bottom water with Skagerrak water or surface water.Furthermore, the dynamics in the region is analyzed with tracers representing the age of the water. The distribution of age tracers with different boundary conditions are analyzed, and the role of advection and mixing for ventilating the bottom water is quanti?ed in terms of the water age. It is shown that the Great Belt area is a very dynamical area where bottom water is ventilated with surface water. The interannual variation of the ventilation of bottom water in the period 2001–2003 is analyzed by various age tracers and related to observed oxygen conditions, and it is shown that the extreme hypoxic event in the autumn 2002 in the southern Kattegat, the Great Belt and in the western Baltic Sea coincide with an unusual low vertical ventilation rate in the Great Belt area, but normal advection rates of bottom water from the northern Kattegat. This indicates that during this particular event, and probably in general, ventilation of bottom water in the Great Belt has signi?cant in?uence on oxygen conditions in the southern part of the region and for ventilation of bottom waters in the western Baltic Sea. In contrast, the central Kattegat is primarily ventilated by advection of bottom water from the Skagerrak. An age tracer representing the ventilation rate of bottom water with either Skagerrak water or surface water is shown to be inversely correlated to the observed oxygen distribution in the region.     

Validation of a hybrid optimal interpolation and Kalman filter scheme for sea surface temperature assimilation

A hybrid data assimilation scheme designed for operational assimilation of satellite sea surface temperatures (SST) into an ocean model has been developed and validated against in-situ observations. The scheme consists of an optimal interpolation (OI) part and a greatly simplified Kalman filter (KF) part.The OI is performed only in the longitudinal and latitudinal directions. A climatological field is used as a background field for the interpolation. It is constructed by fitting daily averages of satellite SST to the annual mean, annual, and semiannual harmonics in a 20 km by 20 km grid. The background error covariance is approximated by a spatially varying two-dimensional exponential covariance model. The parameters of the covariance model are fitted to the deviations of the satellite data from the background field using data from a full year.The simplified KF uses ocean model forecasts as a background field. It is based on the assumption that it is possible to neglect horizontal SST covariances in the filter and that the typical time scale for vertical mixing in the mixed layer is much shorter than the average time between observations. We therefore assume that the error variance in a column of water is evenly spread out throughout the mixed layer. The result of these simplifications is a computationally very efficient KF.A one year validation of the scheme is performed for year 2001 using an operational eddy resolving ocean model covering the North Sea and the Baltic Sea. It is found that assimilation of sea surface temperature data reduces the model root mean square error from 1.13 °C to 0.70 °C. The hybrid scheme is found to reduce the root mean square error slightly more than the simplified KF without OI to 0.66 °C. The inclusion of spatially varying satellite error variances does not improve the performance of the scheme significantly.     

‘Tool port’ to ‘landlord port’: a game theory approach to analyse gains from governance model transformation

This study investigates potential port users’ surplus and terminal operators’ profits due to transforming port governance from the ‘tool port’ model to the ‘landlord port’ model. Although the landlord port model is one of the most adopted and successful port governance models, many ports still operate under other models. Chittagong Port, the largest port in Bangladesh, currently operates under the tool port model, while the country’s second-largest port, Mongla Port, operates under the service port model. Chittagong Port is currently facing many challenges, including capacity expansion and renovation of port facilities. Therefore, we form four hypothetical situations for port governance model transformation, assuming that Chittagong Port will transform to the landlord port model but that Mongla Port will run under the existing governance model. Estimating a Bertrand game model, we present a cost-benefit analysis for port users and terminal operators (or port authorities) in hypothetical game situations. The results reveal that privatising one of the container terminals under a landlord setting is the most profitable scenario for Chittagong Port Authority, but privatising all terminals of Chittagong Port yields the highest users’ surplus. However, privatising two of the terminals while they cooperate yields the lowest users’ surplus.