An Integrated Framework of Green Stormwater Infrastructure Planning—A Review

Conventional stormwater management infrastructures show low levels of sustainability owing to the consistent impact of urbanization and climate change, and the green stormwater infrastructure (GSI) has been identified as a more sustainable alternative approach. According to a systematic review, the articles and papers concerning GSI planning are fragmented, especially those discussing the planning steps; thus, an integrated framework of GSI planning is developed here to guide forthcoming planning. In the facility aspect, the research status and prospects of four critical planning steps (i.e., objective formulation, type/scenario evaluation, quantity/scale determination, and site selection) are discussed, and a method of quantifying the relationship between GSI and ecosystem services is given. In the ecosystem aspect, ecosystem resilience promotion is regarded as an approach to guarantee the interaction between hydrological processes and ecological processes, which maintains the sustainable provision of ecosystem services produced by GSI in diverse disturbances. Proposals for future GSI planning research are put forward as comprehensive consideration of the two abovementioned aspects to harvest ecosystem services from GSI directly and to promote the anti-disturbance ability of the ecosystem to guarantee the stable provision of ecosystem services indirectly, which are conducive to the social, economic, and environmental sustainability of GSI.

Customer segment transition through the customer loyalty program

PurposeThis study presents the applicability of a model-based approach for loyalty program forecasting using smartphone app in the digital strategy of the retail industry.Design/methodology/approachThe authors develop a dynamic model with the cyclical structure of customer segments through customer experience. They use time-series data on the number of members of the loyalty program, “Seven Mile Program” and confirm the validity of the approximate calculation of customer segment share, customer segment sales share and aggregate sales performance. The authors present three medium-term forecast scenarios after the launch of a smartphone payment service linked with the loyalty program.FindingsThe sum of the two customer segment shares for forecasting (the sum of the quasi-excellent and excellent customer ratios) is about 30% in each scenario, consistent with an essential customer loyalty (true loyalty) share obtained in the existing empirical study.Research limitations/implicationsDigital strategy in the retail industry should focus more on estimating and forecasting average amounts of customer segments and the number of aggregated customers through the digitalization on the customer side than on individual customer journeys and responses.Practical implicationsMulti-scenario evaluation through simulation of dynamic models from a systemic view can be used for decision-making in retailing digital strategies.Originality/valueThis study builds a model that integrates the cyclicality of customer segment transition through customer experiences into a loyalty matrix framework, which is a method that has previously been used in the hospitality industry.

Parametric Thinking in Form-Based Code Evaluation

The concept of Form-Based Code is of central importance in American New Urbanism. There is an increasing concern on Form-Based Code’s components and adoptions in cities and countries in the USA. This paper aims to extend Form-Based Code’s study to high-density cities of Asia. It explores the methodology of embedding parametric thinking into the multi-scenario evaluation of Form-Based Code. The methodology framework is developed by taking advantage of parametric modelling instruments which visualizes the coding procedure on software interfaces. Using Tsim Sha Tsui, Hong Kong as the experimental site, the paper concludes with a parametric evaluation system towards a walkable and accessible environment in the volumetric urban morphology of high-density cities.

Parametric Thinking in Form-Based Code Evaluation

The concept of Form-Based Code is of central importance in American New Urbanism. There is an increasing concern on Form-Based Code’s components and adoptions in cities and countries in the USA. This paper aims to extend Form-Based Code’s study to high-density cities of Asia. It explores the methodology of embedding parametric thinking into the multi-scenario evaluation of Form-Based Code. The methodology framework is developed by taking advantage of parametric modelling instruments which visualizes the coding procedure on software interfaces. Using Tsim Sha Tsui, Hong Kong as the experimental site, the paper concludes with a parametric evaluation system towards a walkable and accessible environment in the volumetric urban morphology of high-density cities.

Applying System-Oriented Sustainability Scoring for Cruise Traffic Port Operators: A Case Study of Geiranger, Norway

Balancing the positive and negative impacts of cruise tourism is a challenging task for port operators. Necessary information for cruise port planning and decision making may be laborious to acquire and further combine for holistic decision support. The current study applies a system-oriented sustainability scoring model to the port of Geiranger, Norway. The aim is to provide a practical and low-threshold approach for appraising sustainability aspects in cruise port planning and decision making. The scoring model provides an estimate of performance on sustainability indicators based on cruise call itinerary information and readily available ship data. Results demonstrate how using the scoring model can prove useful for both port management, planning, stakeholder communication and scenario evaluation.

Road Pavement Information Modeling through Maintenance Scenario Evaluation

Road maintenance operations involve the preservation of the optimal functionality of the pavement. Sometimes the rehabilitation of the pavement layout does not have long lasting effects due to a lack of compliance with the constraints imposed by the technical specifications for the design of materials. The purpose of this paper is to present an efficient BIM tool to help in road maintenance operations through the management of data arising from laboratory testing of road pavement bituminous materials required for the quality control of mixtures. The database associated to the BIM model is a collection of three years of data derived from laboratory investigation on bituminous mixtures’ samples adopted for the maintenance of four main roads located in southern Italy. An algorithm that interacts with the three-dimensional road model has been implemented in order to give road administrations an easy-to-read alert signal for the road pavement structure of the road network that may present the most critical conditions due to poor mechanical and physical features.

Object Detection Using Deep Learning Methods in Traffic Scenarios

The recent boom of autonomous driving nowadays has made object detection in traffic scenes a hot topic of research. Designed to classify and locate instances in the image, this is a basic but challenging task in the computer vision field. With its powerful feature extraction abilities, which are vital for object detection, deep learning has expanded its application areas to this field during the past several years and thus achieved breakthroughs. However, even with such powerful approaches, traffic scenarios have their own specific challenges, such as real-time detection, changeable weather, and complex lighting conditions. This survey is dedicated to summarizing research and papers on applying deep learning to the transportation environment in recent years. More than 100 research papers are covered, and different aspects such as key generic object detection frameworks, categorized object detection applications in traffic scenario, evaluation metrics, and classified datasets are included. Some open research fields are also provided. We believe that it is the first survey focusing on deep learning-based object detection in traffic scenario.

A Study on the Analysis of Sprinkler Operating Probability Using Building Fire Statistics

In Korea, considering that the accuracy of fire scenario evaluation is reduced by performance-based design, it is assumed that the sprinkler does not operate. In other countries, the design continues to be researched considering the operation probability of the sprinkler. In particular, the operation probability that divides the effect after operation is analyzed. Therefore, the operation probability was analyzed by considering the effect of sprinkler operation using domestic fire statistics. As a result, it was found that the probability of successful operation for fire extinguishment was 44%, the success of suppression was 32%, and failure to operate was 24%. As a result of a comparison with data from other countries, the probability of operating, 76%, was lower than that of studies from other countries. When comparing the probability results for successful fire extinguishment, success of suppression, and failure to operate, it was confirmed that the probability of successful suppression was slightly different.