Factors influencing support for local transportation sales tax measures

Sales tax measures passed at the local level and dedicated to transportation projects have become increasingly popular in the United States. While revenues from fuel taxes stagnate, growth of local transportation sales taxes (LTSTs), most approved in local elections, has led to a gradual shift of the financial base for transportation projects away from user fees and toward broader-based taxes. In this study, the relationship between voter support and the social, political, and geographic characteristics of the voters is explored. Using precinct-level voting data and census demographic data for three local transportation sales tax elections in Sonoma County, in the San Francisco Metropolitan area of California, regression models were constructed to analyze this relationship. In addition, the relationship between the outcomes of the three measures was explored to better understand which transportation projects might have garnered more support for the successful measure. It was found that the closer voters lived to the transportation projects to be funded, the greater their support. Higher incomes were also positively related to support, controlling for other variables. Political leanings were found to affect support, with the direction of the effect dependent upon the project list in each measure’s expenditure plan. Finally, it appears that the latest measure, which passed successfully, benefited greatly from its multi-modal expenditure plan.     

Simulating the impacts of household travel on greenhouse gas emissions,urban air quality,and population exposure

This paper establishes a link between an activity-based model for the Greater Toronto Area (GTA), dynamic traffic assignment, emission modelling, and air quality simulation. This provides agent-based output that allows vehicle emissions to be tracked back to individuals and households who are producing them. In addition, roadway emissions are dispersed and the resulting ambient air concentrations are linked with individual time-activity patterns in order to assess population exposure to air pollution. This framework is applied to evaluate the effects of a range of policy interventions and 2031 scenarios on the generation of vehicle emissions and greenhouse gases in the GTA. Results show that the predicted increase of approximately 2.6 million people and 1.3 million jobs in the region by 2031 compared to 2001 levels poses a major challenge in achieving meaningful reductions in GHGs and air pollution.     

Isolating high-priority metro and feeder bus transfers using smart card data

Fixed-rail metro (or ‘subway’) infrastructure is generally unable to provide access to all parts of the city grid. Consequently, feeder bus lines are an integral component of urban mass transit systems. While passengers prefer a seamless transfer between these two distinct transportation services, each service’s operations are subject to a different set of factors that contribute to metro-bus transfer delay. Previous attempts to understand transfer delay were limited by the availability of tools to measure the time and cost associated with passengers’ transfer experience. This paper uses data from smart card systems, an emerging technology that automatically collects passenger trip data, to understand transfer delay. The primary objective of this study is to use smart card data to derive a reproducible methodology that isolates high priority transfer points between the metro system and its feeder-bus systems. The paper outlines a methodology to identify transfer transactions in the smart card dataset, estimate bus headways without the aid of geographic location information, estimate three components of the total transfer time (walking time, waiting time, and delay time), and isolate high-priority transfer pairs. The paper uses smart card data from Nanjing, China as a case study. The results isolate eight high priority metro-bus transfer pairs in the Nanjing metro system and finally, offers several targeted measures to improve transfer efficiency.     

Simulation of mixed gas formation for a spray-wall complex guided LPG direct injection engine

To obtain an ultralean air-fuel ratio and to reduce engine-out NOX and HC emissions induced by the richer mixture near the spark plug, a spray and wall complex guided combustion system has been developed by utilizing the fuel characteristics of LPG. The new combustion system configuration is optimized by using a commercial CFD code, FIRE V2013, and the reliability of the system has been experimentally demonstrated by Plane Laser-Induced Fluorescence (PLIF). The mixture formation in the new combustion system under part load (2,000 rpm) is numerically simulated. With an injection timing of 40°CA BTDC, the LPG spray which is injected from two upper holes, reaches the ignition point, and the other part of the LPG spray which is injected from the bottom hole, is directed to the ignition point through the vertical vortices at the same time. At the ignition timing of about 20°CA BTDC, the two-part mixtures have been shown to form a stable and richer stratified mixture around the ignition point, and the maximum global air-fuel ratio reaches to 60: 1.     

Wave propagation in head on bonnet impact: Material and design issues

Head on bonnet impact is becoming more and more important in automotive design as regulations on pedestrian safety become more demanding. Despite the relatively low amount of energy involved, these impacts are truly dynamic phenomena as the event duration is comparable with the traveling time of the different wavefronts generated by the impact. In this paper, we show that we can build up a simplified model for the impact based on wave propagation analysis. Using this model, we can analyze head acceleration on existing bonnets or predict it on new ones. Head acceleration in a bonnet impact can thus be estimated over the whole area of the bonnet with a few minutes of CPU.     

Comparison of fuel efficiency and exhaust emissions between the aged and new DPF systems of Euro 5 diesel passenger car

This study was conducted to examine the impact of aged and new DPF systems of the Euro 5 diesel passenger car on fuel efficiency and exhaust emissions. Test diesel vehicle used in this study was equipped with diesel oxidation catalyst (DOC) and diesel particulate filter (DPF) as aftertreatment systems, and satisfied the Euro-5 emissions standard. The displacement volume of engine was 1.6 L and the cumulative mileage was 167,068 km before the test. The FTP-75 test procedure was used, and the time resolved and weight based exhaust emissions of total hydrocarbon (THC), carbon monoxide (CO) and nitrogen oxides (NOx) were measured. The results show that the vehicle with the new DPF system has lower emissions of THC, CO and NOx than the aged one, and fuel efficiency also increased about 5 percent. The aged DPF system had higher backpressure due to the particulate matter (mostly in the form of ash) accumulated in the DPF. As was shown in the analysis using X-CT (X-ray computer tomography), the aged DPF system had particulate matter (PM) accumulated to a length of 46.6 mm. In addition, a component analysis of PM through XRF (X-ray fluorescence) analysis found that 50 % or more of the components consisted of the P, S, Ca, and Zn.     

Robust control for four-wheel-independent-steering electric vehicle with steer-by-wire system

A four-wheel-independent-steering (4WIS) electric vehicle (EV) with steer-by-wire (SBW) system is proposed in this paper. The fast terminal sliding mode controller (FTSMC) is designed for the SBW system to suppress external disturbances. Taking unstructured and structured uncertainties into consideration, a robust controller is designed for the 4WIS EV utilizing μ synthesis approach and the controller order reduction is implemented based on Hankel-Norm approximation. Since sideslip angle is the feedback signal of robust controller and it is hard to measure, the extended Kalman filter (EKF) is employed to estimate sideslip angle. To evaluate the vehicle performance with the designed control system, step and sinusoidal steering maneuvers are simulated and analyzed. Simulation results show that the designed control system have good tracking ability, strong robust stability and good robust performance to improve vehicle stability and handing performance.     

Numerical method for simulating tire rolling noise by the concept of periodically exciting contact force

For the numerical simulation of tire rolling noise, an important subject is the extraction of normal velocity data of the tire surface that are essential for the acoustic analysis. In the current study, a concept of periodically exciting contact force is introduced to effectively extract the tire normal velocity data. The ground contact pressure within contact patch that is obtained by the static tire contact analysis is periodically applied to the whole tread surface of stationary tire. The periodically exciting contact forces are sequentially applied with a time delay corresponding to the tire rolling speed. The tire vibration is analyzed by the mode superposition in the frequency domain, and the acoustic analysis is performed by commercial BEM code. The proposed method is illustrated through the numerical experiment of 3-D smooth tire model and verified from the comparison with experiment, and furthermore the acoustical responses are investigated to the tire rolling speed.     

Occupant injury risk analysis at NASS/CDS database

Injury information for vehicle occupants from the body regions of the head, thorax, abdomen, and upper and lower extremities, due to the restraints and interior parts of the vehicle, were extracted from the 2009 ~ 2012 NASS/CDS database. For those cases with high occurrence frequency, a detailed and comprehensive data analysis was performed to find the relationship between the accident, occupant, vehicle, and injury data. A numerical frontal impact sled model with the Hybrid III dummy and the GHBMC human body model was constructed to simulate and identify those injury risks according to NASS/CDS. Among the 5,734 injuries to the aforementioned body regions from frontal crashes are, listed by frequency of occurrence, the lower extremity (27.8 %), upper extremity (21.3 %), thorax (15.1 %), face (10.9 %), spine (8.7 %), head (7.3 %), and abdomen (6.9 %). The main injury sources to the head were the windshield, side structure, and steering wheel. For the thorax and abdomen they were the seat belt and steering wheel. For the lower extremity it was the instrument panel. The main injury patterns for the head were the concussion and the contusion. For the thorax they were vessel laceration and lung contusion. For the abdomen they were laceration and contusion of the organs. For the lower extremity they were bone fracture and ligament rupture. The steering wheel and seat positions were main factors affecting head and thorax injury risks. From the sled impact simulation, high injury risks of the head and thorax were assessed respectively at conditions of steering column tilt down and rear most seat position, which correlated well with the findings from the NASS/CDS data analysis.     

Integrated approach to an optimal automotive timing chain system design

Ensuring engine efficiency is a crucial issue for automotive manufacturers. Several manufacturers focus on reducing the time taken to develop and introduce brand new vehicles to the market. Thus, a synergic approach including various simulations is generally adopted to achieve a development schedule and to reduce the cost of physical tests. This study involved proposing a design process that is very useful in the preliminary development stage through effective support from simulations. This type of simulation-based design process is effective in developing timing chain drives; the use of this process, based on results from multiple trials, showed improvements in performance including low friction and vibration, improved durability, and cost-effective part design when compared to conventional processes. This study proposes an integrated approach to the preliminary design of an automotive timing chain system. The approach involves structural and dynamic analyses. The details of the design process are described by using the case of a virtual engine. This study conducted and summarized a dynamic and structural analysis as well as topological optimization to describe a process to obtain optimal results. The results of this study indicated the following improvements in overall performance factors: 12.1 % improvement in transmission error, 10.1 % reduction in chain tension, 46 % reduction in tensioner arm weight, and 11 % reduction in transversal displacement.