Abstract: The radius-of-curvature (ROC) defines the degree of
curvature along the centerline of a roadway whereby a travelling
vehicle must follow. Roadway designs must encompass ROC in
mitigating the cost of earthwork associated with construction while
also allowing vehicles to travel at maximum allowable design speeds.
Thus, a road will tend to follow natural topography where possible,
but curvature must also be optimized to permit fast, but safe vehicle
speeds. The more severe the curvature of the road, the slower the
permissible vehicle speed. For route planning, whether for urban
settings, emergency operations, or even parcel delivery, ROC is a
necessary attribute of road arcs for computing travel time.
It is extremely rare for a geo-spatial database to contain ROC. This
paper will present a procedure and mathematical algorithm to
calculate and assign ROC to a segment pair and/or polyline.
Abstract: Business Process Reengineering (BPR) is an essential tool before an information system project implementation. Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) projects definitely require the standardization and fixation of business processes from customer order to shipment. Therefore, ERP implementations are well proven to be coupled with BPR, although the extend and timing of BPR with respect to ERP implementation differ. This study aims at analyzing the effects of BPR on ERP implementation success. Basing on two Turkish ERP implementations in pharmaceutical sector, a comparative study is performed. One of the ERP implementations took place after a BPR implementation, whereas the other implementation was without a prior BPR application. Both implementations have been realized with the same consultant team, the case with prior BPR implementation going live first. The results of the case study reveal that if business processes are not optimized and improved before an ERP implementation, ERP live system would face with disharmony problems of processes and processes automated by ERP. This suggests a definite precedence relationship between BPR and ERP applications
Abstract: In Egypt, the concept of Asset Management (AM) is
new; however, the need for applying it has become crucial because
deteriorating or losing an asset is unaffordable in a developing
country like Egypt. Therefore the current study focuses on
educational buildings as one of the most important assets regarding
planning, building, operating and maintenance expenditures. The
main objective of this study is to develop a SAMF for educational
buildings in Egypt. The General Authority for Educational Buildings
(GAEB) was chosen as a case study of the current research as it
represents the biggest governmental organization responsible for
planning, operating and maintaining schools in Egypt. To achieve the
research objective, structured interviews were conducted with senior
managers of GAEB using a pre designed questionnaire to explore the
current practice of AM. Gab analysis technique was applied against
best practices compounded from a vast literature review to identify
gaps between current practices and the desired one. The previous
steps mainly revealed; limited knowledge about strategic asset
management, no clear goals, no training, no real risk plan and lack of
data, technical and financial resources. Based on the findings, a
SAMF for GAEB was introduced and Framework implementation
steps and assessment techniques were explained in detail.
Abstract: Evapotranspiration (ET) is a major component of the hydrologic cycle and its accurate estimation is essential for hydrological studies. In past, various estimation methods have been developed for different climatological data, and the accuracy of these methods varies with climatic conditions. Reference crop evapotranspiration (ET0) is a key variable in procedures established for estimating evapotranspiration rates of agricultural crops. Values of ET0 are used with crop coefficients for many aspects of irrigation and water resources planning and management. Numerous methods are used for estimating ET0. As per internationally accepted procedures outlined in the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization-s Irrigation and Drainage Paper No. 56(FAO-56), use of Penman-Monteith equation is recommended for computing ET0 from ground based climatological observations. In the present study, seven methods have been selected for performance evaluation. User friendly software has been developed using programming language visual basic. The visual basic has ability to create graphical environment using less coding. For given data availability the developed software estimates reference evapotranspiration for any given area and period for which data is available. The accuracy of the software has been checked by the examples given in FAO-56.The developed software is a user friendly tool for estimating ET0 under different data availability and climatic conditions.
Abstract: This paper presents a multi-objective formulation for
optimal siting and sizing of distributed generation (DG) resources in
distribution systems in order to minimize the cost of power losses
and energy not supplied. The implemented technique is based on
particle swarm optimization (PSO) and weight method that employed
to obtain the best compromise between these costs. Simulation
results on 33-bus distribution test system are presented to
demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed procedure.
Abstract: There is a renewed interest in land use transport integration as a means of achieving sustainable accessibility. Such accessibility requires designing more than simply the transport network; it also requires attention to place (built form). Transitoriented development would appear to capture many of the criteria deemed important in land use transport integration. In Perth, Australia, there have been planning policies for the past 20 years requiring transit-oriented development around railway stations throughout the metropolitan area. While the policy intent, particularly at the State level, is clear the implementation of policy has been fairly ineffective. The first part of this paper provides an examination of state and local government planning and transport policies, evaluating them using a set of land use transport integration criteria considered all encompassing. This provides some insight into the extent of state and local government capacity to deliver land use transport integration. The second part of this paper examines the extent of implementation by examining existing and proposed land use around station precincts throughout metropolitan Perth. The findings of this research suggest that the capacity of state and local government to deliver land use transport integration is reasonable in a planning policy sense. Implementation, despite long policy lead times, has been lacking. It appears to be more effective where local planning controls have been suspended with new redevelopment authorities given powers to develop land around railway stations.
Abstract: In today-s competitive market, most companies
develop manufacturing systems that can help in cost reduction and
maximum quality. Human issues are an important part of
manufacturing systems, yet most companies ignore their effects on
production performance. This paper aims to developing an integrated
workforce planning system that incorporates the human being.
Therefore, a multi-objective mixed integer nonlinear programming
model is developed to determine the amount of hiring, firing,
training, overtime for each worker type. This paper considers a
workforce planning model including human aspects such as skills,
training, workers- personalities, capacity, motivation, and learning
rates. This model helps to minimize the hiring, firing, training and
overtime costs, and maximize the workers- performance. The results
indicate that the workers- differences should be considered in
workforce scheduling to generate realistic plans with minimum costs.
This paper also investigates the effects of human learning rates on the
performance of the production systems.
Abstract: To coop with urbanization issues and the economic need for expansion, the city of Jakarta is planning to reclaim more land in the Jakarta Bay. However, the reclamation activities of some islands have barely started and already the developers are facing difficulties in finding sufficient quantities of sand as fill material. When addressing the problem of sand scarcity in the case of Jakarta where, an excess of waste production, an inadequate solid waste management system and a lack of dumping ground pose a major problem, it is hard not to think of the use of waste as alternative fill material. This paper analyses the possibilities of using waste in the land reclamation projects, considering the governmental, social, environmental and economic context of the city. The results identify types of waste that could be used, ways of using those types of waste and implementation conditions for the city of Jakarta.
Abstract: This paper considers the design of a motion planner
that will simultaneously accomplish control and motion planning of a
n-link nonholonomic mobile manipulator, wherein, a n-link
holonomic manipulator is coupled with a nonholonomic mobile
platform, within an obstacle-ridden environment. This planner,
derived from the Lyapunov-based control scheme, generates
collision-free trajectories from an initial configuration to a final
configuration in a constrained environment cluttered with stationary
solid objects of different shapes and sizes. We demonstrate the
efficiency of the control scheme and the resulting acceleration
controllers of the mobile manipulator with results through computer
simulations of an interesting scenario.
Abstract: Urban planning, in particular on protected landscape
areas, demands an increasing role of public participation within the
frame of the efficiency of sustainable planning process. The
development of urban planning actions in Protected Landscape areas,
as Sintra-Cascais Natural Park, should perform a methodological
process that is structured over distinct sequential stages, providing
the development of a continuous, interactive, integrated and
participative planning. From the start of Malveira da Serra and Janes
Plan process, several public participation actions were promoted, in
order to involve the local agents, stakeholders and the population in
the decision of specific local key issues and define the appropriate
priorities within the goals and strategies previously settled. As a
result, public participation encouraged an innovative process that
guarantees the efficiency of sustainable urban planning and promotes
a sustainable new way of living in community.
Abstract: The impact of rain attenuation on wireless communication signals is predominant because of the used high frequency (above 10 GHz). The knowledge of statistics of attenuation is very important for planning point-to-point microwave links operating in high frequency band. Describing the statistics of attenuation is possible for instance with fade duration or level crossing rate. In our examination we determine these statistics from one year measured data for a given microwave link, and we are going to make an attempt to transform the level crossing rate statistic to fade duration statistic.
Abstract: This paper presents a sensor-based motion planning algorithm for 3-DOF car-like robots with a nonholonomic constraint. Similar to the classic Bug family algorithms, the proposed algorithm enables the car-like robot to navigate in a completely unknown environment using only the range sensor information. The car-like robot uses the local range sensor view to determine the local path so that it moves towards the goal. To guarantee that the robot can approach the goal, the two modes of motion are repeated, termed motion-to-goal and wall-following. The motion-to-goal behavior lets the robot directly move toward the goal, and the wall-following behavior makes the robot circumnavigate the obstacle boundary until it meets the leaving condition. For each behavior, the nonholonomic motion for the car-like robot is planned in terms of the instantaneous turning radius. The proposed algorithm is implemented to the real robot and the experimental results show the performance of proposed algorithm.
Abstract: This paper explores the sense of place in the Vredefort Dome World Heritage site, South Africa, as an essential input for the formulation of spatial planning proposals for the area. Intangible aspects such as personal and symbolic meanings of sites are currently not integrated in spatial planning in South Africa. This may have a detrimental effect on local inhabitants who have a long history with the site and built up a strong place identity. Involving local inhabitants at an early stage of the planning process and incorporating their attitudes and opinions in future intervention in the area, may also contribute to the acceptance of the legitimacy of future policy. An interdisciplinary and mixed-method research approach was followed in this study in order to identify possible ways to anchor spatial planning proposals in the identity of the place. In essence, the qualitative study revealed that inhabitants reflect a deep and personal relationship with and within the area, which contributes significantly to their sense of emotional security and selfidentity. Results include a strong conservation-orientated attitude with regard to the natural rural character of the site, especially in the inner core.
Abstract: We consider power system expansion planning under
uncertainty. In our approach, integer programming and stochastic
programming provide a basic framework. We develop a multistage
stochastic programming model in which some of the variables are
restricted to integer values. By utilizing the special property of the
problem, called block separable recourse, the problem is transformed
into a two-stage stochastic program with recourse. The electric power
capacity expansion problem is reformulated as the problem with first
stage integer variables and continuous second stage variables. The
L-shaped algorithm to solve the problem is proposed.
Abstract: The structural interpretation of a part of eastern Potwar
(Missa Keswal) has been carried out with available seismological,
seismic and well data. Seismological data contains both the source
parameters and fault plane solution (FPS) parameters and seismic data
contains ten seismic lines that were re-interpreted by using well data.
Structural interpretation depicts two broad types of fault sets namely,
thrust and back thrust faults. These faults together give rise to pop up
structures in the study area and also responsible for many structural
traps and seismicity. Seismic interpretation includes time and depth
contour maps of Chorgali Formation while seismological interpretation
includes focal mechanism solution (FMS), depth, frequency,
magnitude bar graphs and renewal of Seismotectonic map. The Focal
Mechanism Solutions (FMS) that surrounds the study area are
correlated with the different geological and structural maps of the area
for the determination of the nature of subsurface faults. Results of
structural interpretation from both seismic and seismological data
show good correlation. It is hoped that the present work will help in
better understanding of the variations in the subsurface structure and
can be a useful tool for earthquake prediction, planning of oil field and
reservoir monitoring.
Abstract: Due to the growing dynamic and complexity within
the market environment production enterprises in particular are faced
with new logistic challenges. Moreover, it is here in this dynamic
environment that the Logistic Operating Curve Theory also reaches
its limits as a method for describing the correlations between the
logistic objectives. In order to convert this theory into a method for
dynamically monitoring productions this paper will introduce
methods for reliably and quickly identifying structural changes
relevant to logistics.
Abstract: Climate change causes severe effects on natural
habitats, especially wetlands. These challenges require the adaptation
of their management to probable effects of climate change. A
compilation of necessary changes in land management was collected
in a Hungarian area being both national park and Natura 2000 SAC
and SCI site in favor of increasing the resilience and reducing
vulnerability. Several factors, such as ecological aspects, nature
conservation and climatic adaptation should be combined with social
and economic factors during the process of developing climate
change adapted management on vulnerable wetlands. Planning
adaptive management should be determined by a priority order of
conservation aims and evaluation of factors at the determined
planning unit. Mowing techniques, frequency and exact date should
be observed as well as grazing species and their breed, due to
different grazing, group forming and trampling habits. Integrating
landscape history and historical land development into the planning
process is essential.
Abstract: The concept of sacred and nature have long been
interlinked. Various cultural aspects such as religion, faith, traditions
bring people closer to nature and the natural environment. Memorial
Parks and Sacred Groves are examples of two such cultural
landscapes that exist today. The project mainly deals with the
significance of such sites to the environment and the deep rooted
significance it has to the people. These parks and groves play an
important role in biodiversity conservation and environmental
protection. There are many differences between the establishment of
memorial parks and sacred groves, but the underlying significance is
the same. Sentiments, emotions play an important role in landscape
planning and management. Hence the people and communities living
at these sites need to be involved in any planning activity or
decisions. The conservation of the environment should appeal to the
sentiments of the people; the need to be 'with nature' should be used
in the setting up of memorial forests and in the preservation of sacred
groves.
Abstract: One of the factors to maintain system survivability is
the adequate reactive power support to the system. Lack of reactive
power support may cause undesirable voltage decay leading to total
system instability. Thus, appropriate reactive power support scheme
should be arranged in order to maintain system stability. The strength
of a system capacity is normally denoted as system loadability. This
paper presents the enhancement of system loadability through
optimal reactive power planning technique using a newly developed
optimization technique, termed as Multiagent Immune Evolutionary
Programming (MAIEP). The concept of MAIEP is developed based
on the combination of Multiagent System (MAS), Artificial Immune
System (AIS) and Evolutionary Programming (EP). In realizing the
effectiveness of the proposed technique, validation is conducted on
the IEEE-26-Bus Reliability Test System. The results obtained from
pre-optimization and post-optimization process were compared
which eventually revealed the merit of MAIEP.
Abstract: This paper deals with motion planning of multiple
mobile robots. Mobile robots working together to achieve several
objectives have many advantages over single robot system. However,
the planning and coordination between the mobile robots is
extremely difficult. In the present investigation rule-based and rulebased-
neuro-fuzzy techniques are analyzed for multiple mobile
robots navigation in an unknown or partially known environment.
The final aims of the robots are to reach some pre-defined goals.
Based upon a reference motion, direction; distances between the
robots and obstacles; and distances between the robots and targets;
different types of rules are taken heuristically and refined later to find
the steering angle. The control system combines a repelling influence
related to the distance between robots and nearby obstacles and with
an attracting influence between the robots and targets. Then a hybrid
rule-based-neuro-fuzzy technique is analysed to find the steering
angle of the robots. Simulation results show that the proposed rulebased-
neuro-fuzzy technique can improve navigation performance in
complex and unknown environments compared to this simple rulebased
technique.