Network impacts of a road capacity reduction: Empirical analysis and model predictions

In spite of their widespread use in policy design and evaluation, relatively little evidence has been reported on how well traffic equilibrium models predict real network impacts. Here we present what we believe to be the first paper that together analyses the explicit impacts on observed route choice of an actual network intervention and compares this with the before-and-after predictions of a network equilibrium model. The analysis is based on the findings of an empirical study of the travel time and route choice impacts of a road capacity reduction. Time-stamped, partial licence plates were recorded across a series of locations, over a period of days both with and without the capacity reduction, and the data were ‘matched’ between locations using special-purpose statistical methods. Hypothesis tests were used to identify statistically significant changes in travel times and route choice, between the periods of days with and without the capacity reduction. A traffic network equilibrium model was then independently applied to the same scenarios, and its predictions compared with the empirical findings. From a comparison of route choice patterns, a particularly influential spatial effect was revealed of the parameter specifying the relative values of distance and travel time assumed in the generalised cost equations. When this parameter was ‘fitted’ to the data without the capacity reduction, the network model broadly predicted the route choice impacts of the capacity reduction, but with other values it was seen to perform poorly. The paper concludes by discussing the wider practical and research implications of the study’s findings.     

二语习得——中介语的可变性研究

二语习得的研究促进了教学方法的改进,使英语教学界对英语教学的目的有了更高层面的认识。因为不单是学生还有一些老师也使用中介语,中介语是介于母语和目的语之间的一种语言。这种语言是系统的,充满错误的,不断变化的。文中主要讨论二语习得的重要性,中介语的变异的类型和特征,研究这些变异有助于了解语言学习者的学习过程和改变英语教师对待学生犯错误的看法。     

沥青混合料变异性与拌合楼生产过程控制

针对沥青混合料原材料从进厂到混合料的设计、生产过程中可能存在的变异性问题，笔者提出通过均值控制图以及极差控制图来控制沥青结合料、集料以及拌合楼生产稳定性的方法。研究结果表明，在沥青常规3大指标满足规范要求的前提下，采用软化点的变异系数可以对沥青的出厂性能进行有效控制；当集料的产地或是集料的加工方式改变时，均应按批次严格检测集料的各项指标的变异性以及级配变异性；建议各档料均选取最小筛孔下的变异系数作为控制指标；拌合楼生产的稳定性可以通过均值及极差控制图得到有效控制。     

Mesoscale high-frequency variability in the Alboran Sea and its influence on fish larvae distributions

This work analyses a multidisciplinary data set including hydrological and meteorological data, satellite images, and fish larvae abundance from a high-frequency experiment conducted along a north–south transect across the Western Alboran Sea anticyclonic gyre. Four consecutive occupations of the transect, crossing the frontal area, evidenced the high-frequency variability of hydrological structures and its influence on the latitudinal and vertical distribution of fish larvae in a period of a few days. The influence of dynamical processes on fish larvae depends on the location of the spawning as well as on the larval fish position in the water column. Wind induced upwelling and/or the southward drift of the Atlantic current transport larvae of neritic species, such as Sardina pilchardus and Engraulis encrasicolus to open sea areas. At the same time, these events bring about alterations in the latitudinal and vertical distributions of mesopelagic fish larvae. The species with a relatively surface distribution, as Ceratoscopelus maderensis, were transported and accumulated to the south of the Atlantic Jet (AJ), while those with a deeper distribution in the water column, as Maurolicus muelleri or Benthosema glaciale, would be upwelled and concentrated to the north. This study shows that it is difficult to extract conclusions about the mean or preferential distributions of fish larvae when one single/synoptic survey is considered and that time evolution of hydrological structures has to be considered in order to conclude.     

Assessing the impact of tactical airport surface operations on airline schedule block time setting

With the growth of air traffic, airport surfaces are congested and air traffic operations are disrupted by the formation of bottlenecks on the surface. Hence, improving the efficiency and predictability of airport surface operations is not only a key goal of NASA’s initiatives in Integrated Arrival/Departure/Surface (IADS) operations, but also has been recognized as a critical aspect of the FAA NextGEN implementation plan. While a number of tactical initiatives have been shown to be effective in improving airport surface operations from a service provider’s perspective, their impacts on airlines’ scheduled block time (SBT) setting, which has been found to have direct impact on airlines’ on-time performance and operating cost, have received little attention. In this paper, we assess this impact using an econometric model of airline SBT combined with a before/after analysis of the implementation of surface congestion management (SCM) at John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK) in 2010. Since airlines do not consider gate delay in setting SBT, we find that reduction in taxi-out time variability resulting from SCM leads to more predictable taxi-out times and thus decreases in SBT. The JFK SCM implementation is used as a case study to validate model prediction performance. The observed SBT decrease between 2009 and 2011 at JFK is 4.8 min and our model predicts a 4.2 min decrease. In addition, Charlotte Douglas International Airport (CLT) is used as an example to demonstrate how different surface operations improvements scenarios can be evaluated in terms of SBT reduction.     

基于自然驾驶数据的螺旋匝道(桥) 驾驶人心理负荷分析

为得到驾驶人在螺旋型立交匝道路段行车时的驾驶负荷及影响因素，选取4 座山地城市螺旋型立交开展自然驾驶实验，利用车载仪器采集自然驾驶习惯条件下的驾驶人心电信号. 分析心率幅值特征、心率连续差异均方根( RMSSD )整体分布特征，以及其与匝道半径、坡度之间的关系. 结果表明，影响心理负荷的主要因素是车辆行驶环境和匝道曲率变化. 匝道的分、合流鼻端处，以及行车过程中跟车、超车和会车均会使驾驶人心理负荷增大，驾驶人行驶在上坡路段的紧张感高于下坡路段，匝道半径与RMSSD 存在较强的负相关性. 纵坡坡度与心率变异指标之间呈现两种不同的相关关系：不熟练型驾驶人随着坡度增加，RMSSD 呈线性上升的趋势；一般型和熟练型驾驶人表现为中间高两边低的趋势.     

电喷汽油机燃用甲醇/汽油混合燃料的燃烧特性

为了研究在汽油中掺混不同比例甲醇时对多点电喷汽油机燃烧放热规律的影响,通过实测示功图,对比分析了各种燃烧特征参数随发动机运行工况的变化规律。分析结果表明:在中、低转速时,甲醇/汽油混合燃料发动机的最高燃烧压力和最大压力升高率在中、小负荷时与汽油机基本相同,在大负荷时略高于汽油机;在高转速时混合燃料发动机的最高燃烧压力和最大压力升高率明显高于汽油机;在整个负荷范围内,混合燃料发动机的着火延迟期比汽油机的略长;混合燃料发动机的燃烧持续期在小负荷时比汽油机短,在中、大负荷时与汽油机基本相同;在中、小负荷时,汽油机的最大燃烧放热率和循环变动系数略高于混合燃料发动机,在大负荷时,两者基本相同;发动机转速对燃烧特征参数随掺混比的变化趋势没有明显的影响。     

Accommodating perceptual conditioning in the valuation of expected travel time savings for cars and public transport

Travel time variability (i.e., random variations in travel time) leads to a travel time distribution for a repeated trip from a fixed origin to destination (e.g., from home to work). To represent travel time variability, a series of possible travel times per alternative (departure time, route or mode) are often used in stated choice experiments. In the traditional models, the probabilities associated with different travel scenarios (e.g., arriving early, on time and late) shown in the experiments are directly used as weights. However, evidence from psychology suggests that the shown probabilities may be transformed (underweighted or overweighted) by respondents. To account for this transformation of probabilities, this study incorporates perceptual conditioning through a non-linear probability weighting function into a utility maximisation framework, within which the empirical estimate of the value of expected travel time savings is estimated. The key advantage of this framework is that the estimated willingness to pay value can be directly linked to the source of utility (i.e., the probability distribution of travel time), while taking into account the perceptual transformation of probabilities.     

Multi-day activity-travel pattern sampling based on single-day data

Although it is important to consider multi-day activities in transportation planning, multi-day activity-travel data are expensive to acquire and therefore rarely available. In this study, we propose to generate multi-day activity-travel data through sampling from readily available single-day household travel survey data. A key observation we make is that the distribution of interpersonal variability in single-day travel activity datasets is similar to the distribution of intrapersonal variability in multi-day. Thus, interpersonal variability observed in cross-sectional single-day data of a group of people can be used to generate the day-to-day intrapersonal variability. The proposed sampling method is based on activity-travel pattern type clustering, travel distance and variability distribution to extract such information from single-day data. Validation and stability tests of the proposed sampling methods are presented.     

Numerical simulations of seasonal and interannual variability of the Black Sea thermohaline circulation

The Black Sea general circulation is simulated by a primitive equation model with active free surface. The forcing is seasonally variable and is based on available climatic data. The model reproduces the main features of the Black Sea circulation, including the river discharge effects on the mean sea level and the Bosphorus outflow. Model results show that the simulated sea surface elevation increases in spring over the whole sea, reaching a maximum in the Danube delta area. In the same region, a minimum is observed in winter. The amplitude of the seasonal oscillations (about 8–12 cm over the whole basin) is of the same order of magnitude as the maximum horizontal variations (about 15–18 cm between the coastal areas and the basin interior). This strong signal formed mostly by river discharges, along with the seasonal variability in the other forcing functions and the local dynamics creates a well-pronounced interannual variability. The performance of the model in simulating the seasonal and interannual variability is critically analyzed, with a special attention on the cold intermediate water formation and the circulation in the upper 150 m. The simulations demonstrate that the source of intermediate waters is on the shelf, and that the water mass in the core of cold intermediate layer changes with time as a response to the periodic forcing at sea surface. This type of variability is characterized by pronounced interannual changes, proving that important differences could exist between water mass structure in different years, even when using identical atmospheric forcings each year.