Optimization of transport and technological processes by the method dynamic programmingе

С ростом экономического потенциала страны, реализацией масштабных инфраструктурных проектов актуализируются проблемы оптимизации многоуровневых и многоэтапных управленческих решений на основе методов математического моделирования. В работе исследуются оптимизационные подходы к моделированию региональных и локальных транспортных систем с использованием принципов динамического программирования при соотнесении объемов грузопотоков провозному потенциалу транспортных системы с определением оптимального маршрута движения потока. Принимая во внимание, что транспорт не создает новых вещественных ценностей, а только их перемещает в пространстве предлагаемые подходы организации, планирования и управления создадут условия для получения существенного эффекта на основе оптимизации прогнозирования и совершенствования организационного механизма управления транспорто – технологическими процессами. Излагаются общие принципы построения модели динамического программирования применительно к региональной и локальной транспортной системам, при распределении ресурсов между различными объектами, их использования по уточнённым периодам времени, для получения максимального эффекта от принятого способа распределения. Обосновано прикладное использование моделей динамического программирования, при организации и исследовании, несмотря на то, что базовые параметры ограничены размерностью переменной состояния системы. Вместе с тем данное обстоятельство не снижает ценности и практической значимости метода, а позволяет провести границу между областями динамического программирования и другими математическими методами, с обоснованием преимуществ и прикладного универсального значения. Предлагается методический инструментарий повышения эффективности региональной и локальных транспортных систем при тенденции к общем увеличении грузооборота. With the growth of the economic potential of the country, the implementation of large-scale infrastructure projects is updated to optimize multi-level and multi-step management solutions based on mathematical modeling methods. The paper explores optimization approaches to modeling regional and local transport systems using the principles of dynamic programming in relation to the volume of freight traffic volumetric potential of transport systems with the definition of the optimal flow route. Taking into account that transport does not create new real values, but only they move them in space. The proposed approaches of the organization, planning and management will create conditions for obtaining a significant effect on the basis of optimizing forecasting and improving the organizational mechanism of transport management - technological processes. General principles for building a dynamic programming model in relation to regional and local transport systems, when distributing resources between different objects, their use on refined periods of time, to obtain a maximum effect from the received distribution method. Applied use of models of dynamic programming, with the organization and study, despite the fact that the basic parameters are limited to the dimension of the system status variable. At the same time, this circumstance does not reduce the value and practical significance of the method A, makes it possible to carry out the border between the areas of dynamic programming and other mathematical methods, with the rationale for the advantages and applied universal value. A methodological toolkit of increasing the efficiency of regional and local transport systems with a tendency to a general increase in cargo turnover is proposed.

Factors Influencing Cycling among Secondary School Adolescents in an Ethnically Diverse City: The Perspective of Birmingham Transport Stakeholders

Despite strategies and schemes to increase cycling among adolescents in England, the levels of cycling among secondary school adolescents in various cities is low. This study aims to understand the factors influencing cycling among Birmingham secondary school adolescents from the perspectives of local transport stakeholders promoting cycling among secondary school adolescents. In 2019, 14 local transport stakeholders promoting cycling among secondary school adolescents in Birmingham participated in a semi-structured interview. The discussions focused on barriers and facilitators to increasing cycling among secondary school adolescents for school and non-school travel. Thematic content analysis was performed using NVIVO 12. The five-level socio-ecological model provided the framework for the analysis, resulting in five main themes. The study found the majority of the schemes and programs organised to increase cycling among secondary school adolescents focused on promoting school travel, with less focus on non-school travel. It was noted that cycling for leisure was more appealing to adolescents than utility cycling. Future interventions should include cycling promotion for non-school travel. In addition, increased support for leisure cycling may increase the overall appeal and enthusiasm of cycling among adolescents.

Social Sustainability and Ulaanbaatar’s ‘Ger Districts’: Access and Mobility Issues and Opportunities

This paper explores the concept of social sustainability in Ulaanbaatar’s ger districts in relation to access and mobility. Although ger districts are well-established in Mongolian culture as ephemeral encampments with transient residents, contemporary ger districts have become large and permanent residential districts that are now home to an estimated one-third of the country’s population. The more recent growth of the ger districts has taken place in three decades since Mongolia embraced market-based liberal economics, coinciding with waves of socially and economically-motivated urbanisation. More recently, difficult environmental conditions in rural Mongolia have created new waves of migration. The unfolding situation means that the ger districts have grown with little of the forward planning present in other built areas of the city. In turn, this has led to significant imbalances in the provision of transport services into the ger districts and the problems of access and mobility that this paper has highlighted. This paper has identified community-based local transport and delivery services as one potential means for addressing existing access and mobility shortcomings. Such approaches could provide temporary or complementary services alongside other public policy approaches.

Formalized model and algorithm for managing complex interaction of heterogeneous transport

The problem of ensuring the reliability of heterogeneous transport systems is extremely multifaceted and covers all stages of development - from design to operation. To increase efficiency, there is a need to harmonize the processes taking place in heterogeneous systems within the framework of single transport communication. The lack of appropriate theoretical justification leads in practice to the emergence of insufficiently substantiated decisions, because of which subsequent efforts made to eliminate the discovered shortcomings are, as a rule, costly and ineffective. Assessment of the system of integrated regulation of the transport system, from the point of view of its sustainability, is an indispensable condition for its operational efficiency and reliability. The efficiency of transport processes assumes that the effective functioning of local transport systems is ensured by the level of interaction between participants in the transport process, modes of transport that create positive dynamics of transit freight turnover. The paper substantiates the need for complex interaction in the management of the regional transport system, considering the interaction of adjacent modes of transport in a single information space. The method describes in detail the solution of forecasting and coordination problems in maritime transport systems, harmonization of the interests of heterogeneous transport in solving forecasting and control problems.

Street images classification according to COVID-19 risk in Lima, Peru: A convolutional neural networks analysis

Background: During the COVID-19 pandemic, convolutional neural networks (CNNs) have been used in clinical medicine (e.g., to classify chest X-rays for COVID-19 diagnosis). Whether CNNs could also inform the epidemiology of COVID-19 analysing street images has been understudied, though it could identify high-risk places and relevant features of the built environment. We trained CNNs to classify bus stops (Lima, Peru) into moderate or extreme COVID-19 risk. Methods: We used five images per bus stop. The outcome label (moderate or extreme) for each bus stop was extracted from the local transport authority. We used transfer learning and updated the output layer of five CNNs: NASNetLarge, InceptionResNetV2, Xception, ResNet152V2, and ResNet101V2. We chose the best performing network which was further tuned to increase performance. Results: There were 1,788 bus stops (1,173 moderate and 615 extreme), totalling 8,940 images. NASNetLarge outperformed the other CNNs except in the recall metric for the extreme label: 57% versus 59% in NASNetLarge and ResNet152V2, respectively. NASNetLarge was further tuned and reached: training loss of 0.50; training accuracy of 75%; precision, recall and F1 score for the moderate label of 80%, 83% and 82%, respectively; these metrics for the extreme label were 65%, 51% and 63%. Conclusions: CNNs has the potential to accurately classify street images into levels of COVID-19 risk. In addition to applications in clinical medicine, CNNs and street images could also advance the epidemiology of COVID-19 at the population level.

Tourism and intraregional transport: The assimilation of local transport in tourist destination – the perception of Lisbon’s residents

This article aims to analyze the importance that scientific research has given to tourists’ transport, understand the perception of visitors on the adequacy of intraregional transport in the visited destinations, understand the value different type of transports assume in tourist visits, identify the most used means of locomotion in a tourist destination and evaluate the acceptance levels of a tourist transport circuit organized with crossing points at the main touristic attractions, where visitors can leave their vehicles in strategically located car depots. In this case study, 226 valid respondents were considered. The main conclusion of this research is that Portuguese visitors do not consider adequate the supply of public and collective transportation in the national destinations they visit. Not only, most travellers do not use this type of transport to reach a travel destination as, once there, they won’t use it. Different factors influence the choice of the travel transportation but if the destination provides efficient supply of collective transportation or environmental vehicles for individual use, visitors are willing to drop their vehicles in car deposits outside touristic centres.

Coherent Eddies Transporting Passive Scalars Through the Plant Canopy Revealed by Large-Eddy Simulations Using the Lattice Boltzmann Method

A double-distribution-function lattice Boltzmann model for large-eddy simulations of a passive scalar field in a neutrally stratified turbulent flow is described. In simulations of the scalar turbulence within and above a homogeneous plant canopy, the model’s performance is found to be comparable with that of a conventional large-eddy simulation model based on the Navier–Stokes equations and a scalar advection–diffusion equation in terms of the mean turbulence statistics, budgets of the second moments, power spectra, and spatial two-point correlation functions. For a top-down scalar, for which the plant canopy serves as a distributed sink, the variance and flux of the scalar near the canopy top are predominantly determined by sweep motions originating far above the canopy. These sweep motions, which have spatial scales much larger than the canopy height, penetrate deep inside the canopy and cause scalar sweep events near the canopy floor. By contrast, scalar ejection events near the canopy floor are induced by coherent eddies generated near the canopy top. The generation of such eddies is triggered by the downward approach of massive sweep motions to existing wide regions of weak ejective motions from inside to above the canopy. The non-local transport of scalars from above the canopy to the canopy floor, and vice versa, is driven by these eddies of different origins. Such non-local transport has significant implications for the scalar variance and flux budgets within and above the canopy, as well as the transport of scalars emitted from the underlying soils to the atmosphere.

Creating the Imperial City

This chapter discusses the creation of imperial cities: Paris was remodelled by Napoleon III, the layout of Vienna was altered in the era of Franz Joseph, and Berlin was expanded under Wilhelm I and Wilhelm II from a Prussian into an imperial capital. In each case this meant creating broad boulevards, green spaces, and impressive buildings, but also providing clean water, efficient sewage systems, street lighting, and local transport. Monuments celebrating victories and generals were also part of the urban design. London only built a ceremonial avenue in the twentieth century. Maximilian had great plans for Mexico City based on what he had seen in Paris, Vienna, and Brussels, while Pedro II built Petrópolis, a summer residence in the hills above Rio de Janeiro.