Urban Infrastructure: Design and Preservation - Brooklyn Bridge Rehabilitation Program

Author(s):  
Robert Collyer ◽  
Hasan Ahmed ◽  
Raj Navalurkar ◽  
Dawn Harrison

<p>The Brooklyn Bridge is a National Historic Landmark and a New York City Landmark that has been in use for over 137 years. This is one of the most pictured bridge structures in the world, while being used as a critical and vital part of the infrastructure carrying over 105,000 vehicles per day. This paper addresses the engineering challenges/solutions related to the most current rehabilitation work being performed.</p><p>Contract 6 (2009 to 2017) represents a $650 million investment into the bridge to maintain it in a State of Good Repair. Work included deck replacement using accelerated bridge construction techniques and complete painting and steel repairs of the main span. A high-level traffic study and traffic simulations were developed to evaluate differing closure scenarios and their impacts on user costs and the traveling public.</p><p>Contract 6A (2017 to 2019) represents a $25 million investment in maintaining the historic and aesthetic integrity of the Brooklyn Bridge structures. Approximately, 30,000 SF of granite stone cladding will be replaced under this contract.</p><p>Contract 7 represents a $300 million investment that will address the rehabilitation of the historic arches on both sides of the main span and strengthening of the Towers. Construction is expected to begin in 2019.</p><p>Contract 8 represents a $250 million investment. It is in the planning phase and will address a new promenade enhancement (widening) over the Brooklyn Bridge.</p><p>This paper discusses how these engineering challenges were faced and resolved.</p>

Author(s):  
Coby Klein ◽  
Mitchell Baker ◽  
Andrei Alyokhin ◽  
David Mota-Sanchez

Abstract Eastern New York State is frequently the site of Colorado potato beetle (Leptinotarsa decemlineata, Say) populations with the highest observed levels of insecticide resistance to a range of active ingredients. The dominance of a resistant phenotype will affect its rate of increase and the potential for management. On organic farms on Long Island, L. decemlineata evolved high levels of resistance to spinosad in a short period of time and that resistance has spread across the eastern part of the Island. Resistance has also emerged in other parts of the country as well. To clarify the level of dominance or recessiveness of spinosad resistance in different parts of the United States and how resistance differs in separate beetle populations, we sampled in 2010 beetle populations from Maine, Michigan, and Long Island. In addition, a highly resistant Long Island population was assessed in 2012. All populations were hybridized with a laboratory-susceptible strain to determine dominance. None of the populations sampled in 2010 were significantly different from additive resistance, but the Long Island population sampled in 2012 was not significantly different from fully recessive. Recessive inheritance of high-level resistance may help manage its increase.


Author(s):  
Benjamin Nicoletta ◽  
John Gales ◽  
Panagiotis Kotsovinos

<p>Recent trends towards performance-based fire designs for complex and critical structures have posed questions about the fire resilience of bridge infrastructure. There are little-to-no code requirements for bridge fire resistance and practitioner guidance on the subject is limited. Research on the fire performance of cable-supported bridge structures is scarce and knowledge gaps persist that inhibit more informed fire protection designs in a variety of bridge types. There have been few numerical or experimental studies that investigate the fire performance of steel stay-cables for use in cable-supported bridges. The thermal response of these members is critical as cable systems are highly dependent on the response of individual members, such as in the case of an anchor cable for example. The study herein examines the thermal response of several varieties of unloaded steel- stay cable during exposure to a non-standard methanol pool fire and the implications for the structural response of a cable-supported bridge. Experimental thermal strain data from fire tests of various stay-cables is used to inform high-level insights for the global response of a cable-supported bridge. Namely, the effects of cable thermal expansion on the overall cable system is approximated.</p>


2017 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 682-693 ◽  
Author(s):  
Víctor Genina

On September 19th, 2016, the United Nations (UN) General Assembly adopted Resolution 71/1, the text of the New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants (the “New York Declaration”). Resolution 71/1 is the outcome document of the high-level plenary meeting on addressing large movements of refugees and migrants, held at the UN headquarters. The New York Declaration reflects how UN member states have decided to address the challenge of large movements of people in two main legal categories: asylum seekers/refugees and migrants. Resolution 71/1 includes an annex titled “Towards a Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration” (the “global compact for migration” or “global compact”). This document is comprised of several thematic issues related to international migration that will be the basis of a globally negotiated agreement on how member states should respond to international migration at the national, regional, and international levels, as well as to issues related to international migration and development. The global compact for migration is intended to be adopted at a conference on international migration and development before the inauguration of the 73rd annual session of the UN General Assembly in September 2018. This paper addresses how UN member states should plan to address international migration in the future. It does not refer to refugees and asylum seekers: a global compact on refugees will be drafted by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in 2018, and to be presented to the UN General Assembly for states' consideration during its 73rd annual session, which starts in September 2018.1 For those who have been involved in migration issues within the United Nations, the fact that member states have finally agreed to convene an international conference on international migration represents a major achievement. It is the result of an extended process that started decades ago and was made possible by a long chain of efforts by many state delegations and other stakeholders. The global compact for migration will not be the first outcome document dealing exclusively with international migration. A declaration2 adopted at a high-level meeting at the United Nations in October 2013, for example, paved the way for the 2018 conference. Nonetheless, the global compact represents a unique opportunity to address international migration comprehensively and humanely. This paper contributes to the discussion on the elements that should be included in the global compact for migration. The paper is divided into two sections. The first section analyzes the main elements of Annex II, “Towards a Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration,” and the criteria that needs to be adopted in order to achieve a substantive outcome. In particular, participants in the negotiation process should aim to balance the concerns of states and the members of host societies, on one hand, with the needs and rights of migrants, on the other. The second section includes proposals to enrich the final global compact for migration and takes into account two documents written by two different actors within the UN system, the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Migration, and the Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights of Migrants. In particular, the paper proposes that the global compact for migration: • sets forth principles that can inform the actions of governments in relation to international migration at all levels; • enunciates a clearer definition of state protection responsibilities in relation to migrants in crisis situations and so-called “mixed flows”3; affords a substantive role to civil society organizations, the private sector, and academic institutions in the global compact's follow-up and review process; • defines the institutional framework for the implementation and follow-up of the global compact within the United Nations, including through the work of the UN High-level Political Forum on Sustainable Development (HLPF); • establishes a mechanism to fund migration policies for states that lack enough resources to invest sufficiently in this task; and • builds a cooperation-oriented, peer-review mechanism to review migration policies. The paper has been conceived as an input for those who will take part in the negotiation of the global compact for migration, as well as those who will closely follow those negotiations. Thus, the paper assumes a level of knowledge on how international migration has been addressed within the United Nations during the last several years and of the complexities of these negotiation processes. The author took part in different UN negotiation processes on international migration from 2004 to 2013. The paper is primarily based on this experience.4


2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 9 ◽  
Author(s):  
M.G. Aravitska

<p><strong>Objective:</strong> to determine the effectiveness of a physical therapy program for patients with obesity by the indicators of Functional Movement Screen test exercises.</p><p><strong>Materials and methods</strong>. A total of 114 people of the second adulthood with alimentary-constitutional obesity of the I-III degrees were examined. They were divided according to the level of compliance into two groups. The comparison group consisted of individuals with a low level of compliance; they did not go through a rehabilitation program, but were informed about the risks of obesity; acquainted with the basic principles of hypocaloric nutrition and physical activity. The main group consisted of individuals with a high level of compliance; they underwent a developed program for correcting body weight using measures to maintain a high level of compliance, nutrition modification, increased physical activity, lymphatic drainage procedures, and elements of behavioral psychocorrection. The control group consisted of 60 people with no signs of obesity. A survey of the test exercises Functional Movement Screen was conducted in dynamics before and after the one-year period of implementation of the rehabilitation program.</p><p><strong>Results.</strong> During the initial examination in obese patients, all the obtained parameters of the Functional Movement Screen exercises were statistically significantly worse than in individuals with normal body weight (p &lt;0.05). Re-examination of patients with low compliance showed that no statistically significant positive changes occurred in any test test (p&gt; 0.05). When analyzing the results of test exercises of patients with a high level of compliance under the influence of a physical therapy program, a statistically significant improvement was achieved in all studied parameters relative to the initial level (p &lt;0.05).</p><p><strong>Conclusions: </strong>Diagnostics of mobility based on test exercises Functional Movement Screen in physical therapy programs for obese patients is a modern, simple and affordable method of rehabilitation examination. To achieve the target level of the control group for the studied parameters by patients of II-III degree of obesity, the rehabilitation program should be long for one year.</p>


2020 ◽  
Vol 22 (3) ◽  
pp. 63-85
Author(s):  
John Earl Haynes ◽  
Harvey Klehr

William Albertson, who was executive secretary of the New York Communist Party and a member of the National Committee of the Communist Party USA (CPUSA), was framed as an informant for the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in 1964. Only in recent years have newly released FBI records enabled scholars to understand why the FBI undertook the operation and how much damage it did to the CPUSA. In 1964 two leaks from the FBI hinted that the bureau had a high-level informant in the CPUSA who was providing information about secret Soviet subsidies. The leaks were accurate and endangered one of the FBI's most successful intelligence operations, Operation Solo, which involved the use of two brothers, Morris Childs and Jack Childs, who were confidants of CPUSA General Secretary Gus Hall, as key informants. The framing of Albertson was intended to deflect CPUSA and Soviet attention from the real FBI informants to a bogus one. The ploy succeeded. The forged documents the FBI planted convinced Hall and other senior CPUSA officials that Albertson was the FBI informant. Despite Albertson's vehement denials and energetic defense, he was expelled. The CPUSA thought it had eliminated the informant, and the Childs brothers were able to continue in their role until old age forced their retirement in 1977.


2019 ◽  
Vol 105 (2) ◽  
pp. 217-225
Author(s):  
James E. Bennett

The mission of the University of Hawai’i at Tell Timai in 2009 began excavating the remains of a limestone temple foundation platform in the north-west area of the site. The foundations had been partially recorded in survey work conducted in 1930 by Alexander Langsdorff and Siegfried Schott, and again in the 1960s by New York University, however no known investigations of the structure were conducted. In 2017 as part of an Egypt Exploration Society Fieldwork and Research Grant, excavations were renewed to finalise the understanding of the temple’s construction techniques, and the date of the temple. The foundations were of a casemate design with internal fills of alternating silt and limestone chips. The ceramic evidence from within the construction fills dates its construction from the end of the Ptolemaic to the early Roman Period, and the temple’s superstructure was most likely taken down and the blocks reused in the late Roman Period (fourth to fifth century ce).


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