A Tool for GIS Based Risk Analysis for Transportation of Dangerous Goods on Road (the RAGISADR)

In this study, an environmental risk analysis model is developed as a decision support system (the RAGISADR) in order to assess environmental risks for transportation of dangerous goods. Transport of dangerous goods needs to be regulated to prevent accidents. Moving dangerous goods by road is governed by international regulations. GIS are used to quantify the factors on each link in the network that contribute to each of the evaluation criteria for a possible route. The Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) is used to assign weights to factors. The priority weights of each environmental criteria is calculated by using Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) before risk models are implemented in the road network of Izmir-Manisa-Aydin-Mugla-Denizli (Aegean Region of Turkey). The most convenient route according to the criteria set is determined. The results give decision maker the possibility to choose the best alternative among possible routes according to certain criteria.

Sustainable Transport System

Transport systems are major emitters of greenhouse gases, which makes environmental sustainability of any transport a crucial issue. Another issue is the lack of a systematic approach to the modeling and implementation of public transport systems. Finally, there are problems with the human interfaces to public transport systems, which do not encourage, and many do not allow, comfortable and simple interaction with the system. In this chapter, the authors discuss their solutions for these problems, explaining how to cover the existing gaps in a methodological and systematic way. The main contribution of this chapter is a model of an on-demand transport system that covers all the points mentioned above and focuses on spatial planning and optimizations including environmental issues in transport planning.

Understanding Accessibility

Accessibility measures are generally concerned with equity and a better distribution of services in a territory and can be accepted as key variables for supporting supply/demand, location/allocation and service/catchment area related planning policies and strategies at national, regional, and local levels. Since accessibility measures need organization of huge and complex spatial data sets, accessibility modeling often lends itself to Geographical Information Systems (GIS) for analysis and presentation. Since numerous accessibility measures and modeling techniques ranging from simple to sophisticated can be found in the literature, this work aim to provide an overview of the theoretical framework and relevant background about GIS-based accessibility modeling process. The results could provide a significant support for the decision makers who are supposed to deal with transportation planning, accessibility modeling, location/allocation and service/catchment area related issues.

Determination of Work Zone Capacity Using ELM, MPMR and GPR

This article examines the capability of Extreme Learning Machine (ELM), Minimax Probability Machine Regression (MPMR) and Gaussian Process Regression (GPR) for determination of Work Zone Capacity. Number of lanes, number of open lanes, work zone layout, length, lane width, percentage trucks, grade, speed, work intensity, darkness factor, and proximity of ramps have been adopted as inputs of ELM, MPMR and GPR. ELM has excellent generalization performance, rapid training speed and little human intervention. MPMR is developed based on the concept of minimax probability machine classification. It does not assume any data distribution. GPR is a probabilistic, and non-parametric model. In GPR, different kinds of prior knowledge can be applied. This article describes a comparative study between the ELM, MPMR and GPR models.

Efficiency Analysis of Turkey's Transportation System Using Decision Support Model

Since the European Union has certain targets and criteria that must be fulfilled by its members, Turkey's situation in transportation compared to the EU member countries (23 countries whose data were accessed) was examined through the approaches of decision support models (Data Envelopment Analysis and Malmquist Index). This study investigates whether Turkey utilizes its road, airway and railway transportation indicators efficiently or not within the framework of the European Union (EU) accession process. In addition, it aims to demonstrate Turkey's current position compared to other EU countries by performing relative efficiency analysis on road, airway and railway transportation indicators. The conclusions of this study will help policymakers to determine Turkey's policy objectives for its integration to the EU in terms of transportation indicators.

A Literature Survey for Hazardous Materials Transportation

Transportation has the greatest importance in logistics. The main focus for the carriers is the cost of transportation. Transportation of hazardous materials (hazmat) is a special kind of transportation due to freight transported. Causalities due to the accidents caused by vehicles that are carrying hazardous materials will be intolerable. For hazmat transportation, in addition to transport costs, risk of transporting hazmat also has to be considered. Many researchers studied on hazmat transportation problems in order to propose optimal solutions with respect to cost, risk, emergency response, facility location etc. In this study, a literature survey of articles about hazmat transportation was prepared. The articles published in refereed journal from 1973 to 2014 were taken into consideration. The articles were also classified according to their main focuses and hazmat type carried.

Smart Technologies for Sustainable Mobility

The emergence of easy mapping tools, widespread cellular network, declining costs of smartphones and increasing internet use by public agencies provide new opportunities towards the betterment of public transport management. Applying decision support systems such as Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) to public transportation tailors transit services to urban dwellers' needs, reducing eco-footprint while making them more accessible. This chapter aims to explore how GIS and ICT can be used for more eco-friendly public transport and improved sense of community. The chapter posits the positive impact of mobile phones and social media towards sustainable mobility. Multi-modal journey planners, mobile bus ticketing, demand responsive transit systems, eco-taxis, electric car and bicycle sharing are explained with examples from the world. The chapter concludes with a discussion of challenges and future options for using smartphones, social networking and the position of disadvantaged groups in sustainable mobility.

Modeling the Change of Urban Spatial Structure: Use Interzonal Travel Data to Estimate Urban Growth and Expansion by Hierarchical Cluster Analyses

The Urban spatial structure is affected by spatial interactions among various activity locations, and land uses in the city over the transportation system. Each city has its unique circulation pattern of passengers and freight due to its unique geographic conditions and the distribution of locations of economic activities. In that sense, it is claimed in this chapter per the authors that urban spatial structure can be modeled using interzonal (O/D) travel data. Thus, the chapter presents a case study of modeling spatial structures developed by employing Hierarchical Cluster Analysis (HCA) using travel pattern data for current and future scenarios. As a result, urban growth and expansion were estimated based on the level of interaction (represented by distance or similarity modeled based on trip interchanges) over the transportation system in terms of population and/or employment increases. The interaction was described by a measure of distance or similarity, modeled with respect to trip interchanges.

The Evolution of Logistics Hubs and a Conceptual Framework for Logistics Hubs Location Decisions

Hubs are special centers that used for switching, transferring and handling freight or passengers in transportation systems. The hub location problem deals with locating hub facilities and allocating demand nodes to hubs in order to route the traffic between origin–destination pairs. Aiming at minimizing the total costs, maximizing utilization of transporters, maximizing the service level, etc., the flow between O–D pairs is dispatched through some selected intermediate logistics centers (called hub nodes) and links connecting the hubs. In this work, a conceptual framework is proposed for hub location decision problem in transportation networks since the previous reviews are out of date. Several models, methods and decision tools are evaluated. Also future trends are added to represent a new point of view for global scale. Since the models and solution approaches are complicated, it is not practical to catch optimum results, and some relevant algorithms will be represented to solve hub models in this chapter.

Multi-Objective Optimizer for Multimodal Distribution Networks

A multi-objective optimizer Decision Support System (DSS) to minimize the operating cost, the carbon footprint and the delivery time in the design of multi-modal Distribution Networks (DNs) is presented to overcome the widely adopted methodologies focused on the cost minimization, only. The proposed approach simultaneously assesses three independent objective functions, evaluating the network costs, the Carbon Footprint (CO2 emissions) and the shipping time from the producers to the final retailers. The DSS manages multimodal four-level (three-stage) DNs, best connecting the producers to the final retailers, through a set of Distribution Centres (DCs). It allows multiple transport modes and inter-modality options looking to the most effective DN configuration from the introduced multi-objective perspective. The three optimization criteria can be considered independently or solved simultaneously, through the so-called Pareto frontier approach. Finally, the proposed DSS is validated against a case study about the delivery of Italian fresh food to several European retailers.