Coastal Tourist Interest in Value-Added,Aquaculture-Based,Culinary Tourism Opportunities

Despite increasing focus on sustainable aquaculture investment in the U.S. coastal zones, the aquaculture industry continues to face skepticism among consumers due to perceived negative environmental impacts, and health and food safety concerns. Partnering with culinary tourism and local food promotion efforts has potential for improving public outreach about the benefits of aquaculture, especially in coastal destinations where sustainable marine aquaculture and tourism are both occurring. Culinary tourism implies that local foods reflect the local livelihood and culture, and may be important to the tourist's experience. Aquaculture is becoming increasingly valuable to coastal destinations for assuring the steady availability of local seafood to meet demand and retaining commercial fisheries as a means to differentiate themselves to tourists. This study examined the role of subjective knowledge and attitude about aquaculture, and their effect on intention to participate in value-added culinary aquaculture tourism experiences. The study found that tourists' subjective knowledge and attitude about aquaculture influenced intentions to participate in culinary aquaculture tourism. In order for farmers or tour operators to be successful in diversifying with value-added culinary aquaculture, attention needs to be paid to educating consumers, which may be possible through strategic partnerships with tourism organizations, chefs, and restaurants.     

Adapting without Retreating: Responses to Shoreline Change on an Inlet-Associated Coastal Beach

Coastal barrier systems around the world are experiencing higher rates of flooding and shoreline erosion. Property owners on barriers have made significant financial investments in physical protections that shield their nearby properties from these hazards, constituting a type of adaptation to shoreline change. Factors that contribute to adaptation on Plum Island, a developed beach and dune system on the North Shore of Massachusetts, are investigated here. Plum Island experiences patterns of shoreline change that may be representative of many inlet-associated beaches, encompassing an equivocal and dynamically shifting mix of erosion and accretion. In the face of episodic floods and fleeting erosive events, and driven by a combination of strong northeast storms and cycles of erosion and accretion, the value of the average Plum Island residence increases by 34% for properties on the oceanfront where protection comprises a publicly constructed soft structure. Even in the face of state policies that ostensibly discourage physical protection as a means of adaptation, coastal communities face significant political and financial pressures to maintain existing protective structures or to allow contiguous groups of property owners to build new ones through collective action. These factors mitigate against adapting to shoreline change by retreating from the coast, thereby potentially increasing the adverse effects of coastal hazards.     

Papahānaumokuākea: Integrating Culture in the Design and Management of one of the World's Largest Marine Protected Areas

Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument is one of the world's largest marine protected areas and was designated the first mixed conservation site in the United States due to its natural and cultural importance. It is also the world's first cultural seascape, being recognized for its continuing connections to indigenous people. As the westernmost place in the Hawaiian universe, many believe these islands and seas are the pathway that Native Hawaiians travel after death, returning to pō (night; realm of the gods). This intimate kinship has profound implications for contemporary management. Current management emphasizes integration of science, policy, cultural knowledge, traditions, and practices to create successful management strategies appropriate for both natural and cultural resources. This management is based on Native Hawaiian values and practices that incorporate observation and understanding of the natural world, indigenous principles and philosophies, cultural norms, community relationships, and unique epistemologies deeply imbedded in and formed by relationships of people with place. A cornerstone of this effort has been the direct involvement of cultural practitioners in policy, management, education, and research. This biocultural approach has led to more effective management of the monument and serves as a model for conservation around the world.     

Methodology for ro-ro ship and fleet sizing with application to short sea shipping

A novel methodology is developed for determining the characteristics of a cargo roll-on/roll-off (ro-ro) ship and the fleet size required for a given short sea shipping route. The ship and required fleet size to satisfy the transportation demand (for each pair of speed and freight rate) are determined using a database of existing cargo ro-ro ships to obtain the main technical characteristics of the most suitable ship. The time charter, voyage costs and revenue are then calculated considering the technical characteristics of each ship. Fuel costs are corrected for the actual ship speed and loading condition. A number of restrictions in the transportation problem are considered leading to the exclusion of unfeasible solutions. The maximum profit over the period of a year is identified among the feasible pairs of speed and freight rate. This general methodology is applied in a case study that considers the route between Leixões (Portugal) and Rotterdam (Netherlands). The study allows the identification of the most suitable ship and fleet sizes for different market penetration levels and quantifies the impact on shipping company profit of changes in parameters such as fuel costs, time charter costs, emission control area, installed propulsion power and stacking factor.     

Intermittent automatic train protection using an infrared system

Automatic train protection (ATP) is a vital part of the signalling system that prevents collisions between trains, especially on densely trafficked lines. Conventionally, ATP uses a transponder to communicate between an onboard train device and a trackside device. In Indonesia, ATP is not yet implemented and all trains are currently operated by drivers. It has now become a necessity to install ATP in Indonesia in order to protect train operations. However, as in many tropical and developing countries there are some environmental problems, especially heavy rain, as well as the theft of trackside equipment that influences performance. Installed trackside devices must therefore meet certain criteria such as low-cost configuration, minimalized devices on the track, ease of maintenance, etc. To address the necessity of ATP and to meet these criteria for trackside devices, we develop ATP using an infrared system. This type of ATP – the intermittent ATP system – consists of onboard devices and infrared sensors as trackside equipment. This approach to ATP offers a cost-effective solution and ensures the safety of train movements.     

The Bid-rent Land Use Model of the simple,efficient, elegant,and effective model of land use and transportation

Integrated land use/transportation forecasting models add significant policy and infrastructure alternatives analysis capabilities to the urban planning process. The financial, time, and staff requirements to develop these models has put them beyond the reach of most small to medium sized urban areas. This paper presents the land use allocation submodel of the Simple, Efficient, Elegant, and Effective model of land use and transportation (SE³M), an integrated land use and transportation forecasting model founded upon Economic Base Theory and Bid-rent Theory. The Bid-rent Land Use Model (BLUM) is an agent based, spatial competition model utilizing unique utility curves for willingness to pay and incomes for budget constrained abilities to pay for each agent. The model structure, estimation, calibration, implementation, and validation are presented. With a single year of land use data available, the validation approach used the Kappa Index of Agreement to spatially check model outputs against base year control data while controlling for agreement by chance. The U.S. territory of Guam is used as the case study/proof of concept implementation for this model framework. Once calibrated, BLUM could solve the spatial competition problem on Guam in less than two minutes of processing time with over 90% accuracy.     

Evaluating air emission inventories and indicators from cruise vessels at ports

This paper provides an estimation of air emissions (CO₂, NO_X, SO_X and PM) released by cruise vessels at the port level. The methodology is based on the “full bottom-up” approach and starts by evaluating the fuel consumed by each vessel on the basis of its individual port activities (manoeuvring, berthing and hoteling). The Port of Barcelona was selected as the site at which to perform the analysis, in which 125 calls of 30 cruise vessels were monitored. Real-time data from the automatic identification system (AIS), factor emissions from engine certificates and vessel characteristics from IHS Sea-web database were also collected for the analysis. The research findings show that the most appropriate indicators are inventory emissions per “port-time gross tonnage”, “port-time passenger” and “port time”. These emission indicators improve our understanding of cruise emissions and will facilitate the work that aims to estimate reliably and quickly the in-port ship emission inventories of cruise ports.     

Shared pilot passage plan and navigational safety during pilotage

Navigating in confined waters with a pilot aboard requires that the pilot’s intention and plan is understood by all present on the bridge. The present study investigates the effect of having a detailed route plan and monitoring it in the context of pilotage. The aim was to see how the presence of a shared pilot passage plan in the Electronic Chart Display and Information System (ECDIS) affects the identification and recovery from navigational errors made by a pilot. Twenty participants, 10 with a shared route plan and 10 without, participated as navigators in a simulator scenario involving pilotage in the Oslofjord. Participants were bachelor students in nautical science. The navigation scenarios involved the intentional error by the pilot just before a predefined way point. Three measurements of relevance to navigational safety were recorded: (1) the time it took the participant to express concern, (2) the time it took the participant to correct the error (‘time to recovery’), and (3) the number of groundings. The study revealed that time to express concern and time to recovery were significantly much shorter for the group with a shared pilot passage plan presented in ECDIS than for the group without such a plan. Providing a bridge team with a shared pilot passage plan in ECDIS during pilotage might improve the ability to identify and correct navigational errors.     

城市道路交通系统频谱分析方法及应用

对实际道路交通系统特征的研究是通过分析布设在路网中不同地点大量交通信息采集设备采集的数据来进行的。交通信息采集是对城市道路交通系统在时间和空闻上一个采样过程,其数据具有时问和空间属性．本文系统地建立了一种城市道路交通系统频谱分析方法。对于时间采样,通过功率谱分析认为：不同的数据采样间隔,获得的交通信息不同,从而分析出的...     

Dynamics of inorganic nutrient species in the Bohai seawaters

Within the frame of a Sino-German Joint Research Program, two cruises of “R/V Dong Fang Hong 2” were carried out in September–October 1998 and April–May 1999, respectively, to understand the dynamics of nutrients in the Bohai. Nutrient species (NO₃⁻, NO₂⁻, NH₄⁺, PO₄³⁻ and SiO₃²⁻) are determined colorimetrically on board for five anchor and 30 grid stations. In situ incubation experiments are performed to determine planktonic nutrient uptake and benthic exchange flux. Nutrient concentrations display short-term variability and seasonal change in the Bohai, with higher levels in shallow coastal waters than in the Central Bohai. The influence of riverine discharge on nutrient levels can be seen from salinity isopleths, nutrient distribution and species ratios. Near-bottom (nb) waters have similar nutrient concentrations as to the surface waters in the Central Bohai, whereas stratification takes place in the Bohai Strait and North Yellow Sea. In situ incubation experiments provide evidence that the uptake ratio (i.e. N, P) by phytoplankton is proportional to the ratios among nutrient species in ambient waters. Based on the data of this study and previously publications, a preliminary estimate of nutrient budgets via riverine input and atmospheric deposition is established. The results indicate that atmospheric deposition gains importance over rivers in delivering nutrients into the Bohai and sustain the new production, following recent decrease in riverine inflow caused by drought periods in North China and damming practices. A historical review of nutrient data indicates that concentrations of nitrogen increase and phosphorus and silica decrease in the Central Bohai over last 40 years. This potentially has an important influence on the health of ecosystem in Bohai (e.g. food web and community structure), though further study is needed to examine the scenario in more detail.