Infrastructure planning is viewed internationally and domestically as the key which unlocks balanced and sustainable economic growth. The emphasis amongst politicians, economists and planning academics has, so far, been upon infrastructure planning of national significance and examining the political, financial and environmental impact of mega projects. However, major infrastructure projects invariably take considerable time to deliver and any positive effects can only be derived in the longer term. Infrastructure planning as practiced within the local planning system has, so far, been overlooked or considered of limited interest in the context of immediate national economic concerns but understanding capacity and capability for effective and integrated infrastructure delivery at the local level is an important part of the equation. Through a national survey of planners and interviews with key delivery stakeholders in the north west this study has investigated infrastructure planning in local planning practice across England. The findings provide evidence that local practitioners in the public, non profit and business sectors are becoming increasingly adept at identifying local and regional infrastructure needs, co-operating on an inter-sectoral basis and ensuring that existing resources are utilised to best effect in their day to day practice. This untapped wealth of local knowledge, skill and expertise has great potential to complement and inform national infrastructure planning decisions and play an important part in stimulating economic recovery.

This research project acknowledged that the introduction of PS 3150 guidelines were presented to Ontario municipalities as a new, unfunded mandated responsibility which was viewed by these municipalities to be an impossible challenge within the completion timeline. This research project identifies impacts that PS 3150 guidelines will have on infrastructure planning for municipalities, with a population of less than 5000, in Northern Ontario. The PS 3150 guidelines were created by the Public Sector Accounting Board (PSAB) of the Canadian Institute of Chartered Accountants (CICA) to outline the general process for public sector organizations to change from a modified accrual format to full accrual accounting complete with new financial statements. Municipalities have had to better account for both financial and non-financial assets when reporting on revenues and expenditures. The evaluation of the policy mandate outlined in PS 3150 guidelines has yet to be completed, however the impacts of the guidelines can be assessed based on the development and subsequent implementation of Tangible Capital Asset policies and asset management plans by municipal governments. The findings identified four key similarities among responses from the municipal representatives. The Impacts of PS 3150 legislation are primarily related to personnel, financial, planning, and technical issues. The key recommendation arising from the completion of this research is that municipalities need to move forward, pursue complete asset management plans, in order to demonstrate in a quantitative manner the costs associated with municipal infrastructure planning.

This research project acknowledged that the introduction of PS 3150 guidelines were presented to Ontario municipalities as a new, unfunded mandated responsibility which was viewed by these municipalities to be an impossible challenge within the completion timeline. This research project identifies impacts that PS 3150 guidelines will have on infrastructure planning for municipalities, with a population of less than 5000, in Northern Ontario. The PS 3150 guidelines were created by the Public Sector Accounting Board (PSAB) of the Canadian Institute of Chartered Accountants (CICA) to outline the general process for public sector organizations to change from a modified accrual format to full accrual accounting complete with new financial statements. Municipalities have had to better account for both financial and non-financial assets when reporting on revenues and expenditures. The evaluation of the policy mandate outlined in PS 3150 guidelines has yet to be completed, however the impacts of the guidelines can be assessed based on the development and subsequent implementation of Tangible Capital Asset policies and asset management plans by municipal governments. The findings identified four key similarities among responses from the municipal representatives. The Impacts of PS 3150 legislation are primarily related to personnel, financial, planning, and technical issues. The key recommendation arising from the completion of this research is that municipalities need to move forward, pursue complete asset management plans, in order to demonstrate in a quantitative manner the costs associated with municipal infrastructure planning.

A current discussion of winner and loser is the issue of low-carbon development toward sustainability. Biofuel, as granted an important role to curtail the carbon emission and secure energy supply, has been also involved in this discussion. However, unfortunately, a biofuel potential has been raising fear worldwide since the surge of its development favors large-scale patterns, which are bringing widely social-economical and environmental impacts. How to foster strengths and circumvent weaknesses to plan this sector is the core of this paper. China has emerged to be the second economic entity with huge appetite for energy. This study is expected to explain China’s experiences in this field with guidance of effective biofuel planning.

No description available.

This dissertation assesses the long-term technological and policy implications of adapting to water constraints and climate change impacts in the energy sector. Energy systems are increasingly vulnerable to climate change and water resource variability. Yet, the majority of long-term energy infrastructure plans ignore adaptation strategy. New analytical approaches are needed to address the spatial and temporal scales relevant to both climate change and water resources. The research in this dissertation overcomes these challenges with improved engineering-economic modeling. Specifically, the conventional systems-engineering energy technology planning framework is extended to incorporate: (1) robust capacity decisions in the electricity sector in light of impacts from hydro-climatic change and uncertain environmental performance of technology options; (2) an endogenous, spatially-distributed representation of water systems and feedbacks with energy demand; and (3) multi-objective decision-making. The computational modeling framework is applied to four regional case study analyses to quantify previously unaccounted for policy-relevant interactions between water, energy and climate systems. Application of the robust adaptation planning framework to the power system in British Columbia, Canada, reveals technology configurations offering long-term operational flexibility will be needed to ensure reliability under projected climate change impacts to provincial hydropower resources and electricity demand. The imposed flexibility requirements affect the suitability of technology options, and increases the cost of long-term electricity system operation. The case study analysis then focuses on the interaction between groundwater conservation and concurrent policy aimed at reducing electricity sector carbon emissions in the water-stressed country of Saudi Arabia. Application of the novel water-energy infrastructure planning framework reveals that transitioning away from non-renewable groundwater use by the year 2050 could increase national electricity demand by more than 40 % relative to 2010 conditions, and require investments similar to strategies aimed at transitioning away from fossil fuels in the electricity sector. The research in this dissertation demonstrates the crucial need for regional planners to account for adaptation to climate change and water resource constraints when developing long-term energy strategy. / Graduate

Citizen participation includes those activities by citizens who are not public officials that are more or less intended to influence the actions taken by government (Verba & Nie, 1972). Citizen initiated contacts are one such form of participation. In 1999, the volume of complaint and service related calls received by the Department of Public Works and Engineering equaled almost 20 percent of the city's population. Via Houston's Customer Response Center, these contacts are logged in, directed to the appropriate department and incorporated into the department's infrastructure management system (IMS). The goal of the IMS is to provide a systems approach to making cost-effective decisions about the design, rehabilitation, construction, retrofitting, maintenance or abandonment of the city's infrastructure (Grigg, 1988). To date, the effectiveness of this program is perceived as less than ideal and the public is critical of the results (Graves, 2002). Residents express concerns that infrastructure projects are targeted towards business and industrial areas while neighborhood needs are being ignored. Politicians are concerned that projects are not equally distributed among the districts. Meanwhile, public works' staff are concerned because there isn't enough money to address citizen calls, business and industrial needs and political concerns in addition to the problems they have identified. The purpose of this research is twofold: to determine if citizen initiated contacts have been a significant factor in the selection of water and sewer projects and, to identify other factors that may play a role in the decision making process. This study is longitudinal in nature, covering the time period between 1992 and 1999. Univariate, bivariate and multivariate analysis were applied to the various data sets provided by the City of Houston. The results of the analysis supports the following: - Citizen contacts have been significant in determining the allocation of water and sewer CIP projects; however, that has not been consistent through the years. - Factors such as race, class, line type, material, size, age and location also factor into the decision making process.

Public procurement is often regarded as rigid, which is why competitive dialogue was implemented. It was also believed to give rise to technical innovations and to create beneficial buying conditions for the public sector. However, many people are sceptic of it, arguing that it does not meet the principles of equal treatment of suppliers and transparency. This thesis seeks to investigate the potential of competitive dialogue and to identify its main challenges. A study of Sweden’s first large infrastructure contract, the Kvarnholmen link, procured with competitive dialogue was therefore undertaken, as well as an extensive literature review. The results show that competitive dialogue is beneficial in several ways: It involves contractors at an early stage and encourages them to find the best solutions to the lowest price. The suppliers get to adapt their tenders to their competence and to take benefit from it. This is a model that seems to have a great potential to improve both public procurement and urban planning.

京都大学 / 0048 / 新制・論文博士 / 博士(工学) / 乙第12981号 / 論工博第4128号 / 新制||工||1637(附属図書館) / 32451 / (主査)教授 小林 潔司, 教授 谷口 栄一, 教授 大津 宏康 / 学位規則第4条第2項該当 / Doctor of Philosophy (Engineering) / Kyoto University / DFAM

<p>  </p> <p>The last century has witnessed increased urban sprawl, motorization, and the attendant problems of congestion, safety, and emissions associated with current-day transportation systems. Contemporary literature suggests that emerging transportation technologies, including vehicle autonomy and connectivity, offer great promise in addressing these adversities. As such, highway agencies seek guidance on infrastructure preparations for connected and automated vehicle (CAV) operations. A key area of such preparations is the management of lanes to serve CAVs and human-driven vehicles (HDVs), including the deployment of dedicated lanes for CAVs. There is a need to address the demand and supply perspectives of CAV preparations. On the demand side, agencies need to model the trends and uncertainties of CAV market penetration and level of autonomy during the CAV transition period. On the supply side, agencies need to schedule the CAV-related roadway infrastructure in a way that progressively addresses the growing demand. </p> <p>In addressing these research questions, this dissertation first carries out an economics-based lane allocation for CAVs and HDVs in a highway corridor by determining the optimum number of CAVLs by minimizing road user cost. Next, the dissertation carries out such allocation considering the environment (community emissions cost). Third, the dissertation addresses elements of social and economic sustainability using a CAV-enabled tradable credit scheme that minimizes user travel time subject to social equity constraints. Further, this dissertation provides guidance on how CAV-dedicated lanes, in conjunction with market-based tradable travel credits, could enable the road agency to achieve maximum efficiency of the existing road infrastructure in the CAV transition period. The study framework can serve as a valuable decision-support tool for road agencies in their long-term planning and budgeting in anticipation of the CAV transition period. The key outcome of the framework is an optimal schedule for deploying CAV-dedicated lanes over a given analysis period of several decades in a manner commensurate with CAV demand projections and sustainability-related objectives and constraints.</p>