No description available.

In response to recent storms like Superstorm Sandy and sea-level rise influenced by climate change, cities, particularly those located at the coast, have taken initiative to combat these growing threats with adaptive urban planning. Although civilians residing in susceptible neighborhoods are often the most vulnerable socioeconomically, there has been minimal evidence that planning has accounted for the characteristics of vulnerability. This thesis evaluates the recent planning efforts and vulnerability of Norfolk, VA and New York City to gauge the progress being made toward reducing citizen vulnerability and raising adaptability and preparedness. The most recent peer-reviewed research is consulted to forge the evaluation framework and also to recognize breakthroughs and conformity. After analyzing the performance of the sets of planning documents in both cities, it is evident that the ability to effectively plan for the public’s vulnerability is contingent in part on inter-governmental capacity, but more specifically on disaster experience.

The concept of heritage is full of conflicts and contestations. The UNESCO’s intervention in the form of the “World Heritage Convention” enriches the meaning of heritage but may exacerbate the intrinsic tensions in heritage while expanding its economic significance through tourism. Heritage tourism is an effective means to realize the economic potential of heritage. This is a major reason why developing countries like China apply for UNESCO world heritage designation. However, some stakeholders take more benefits while others bear more costs in the interplay of heritage conservation and tourism. Achievement of a balance among resource conservation, tourism development, and local community well-being is a pressing challenge for planning and management of World Heritage Sites. This research examines the implications of World Heritage designation for conservation of the world heritage and, particularly, for the lives of local people living in and around the site. It is argued that such people often bear the most costs while often being ignored or disadvantaged in terms of benefits. Sustainability of local life is interdependent with sustainability of heritage conservation and tourism. A key goal of heritage planning should be to mitigate heritage contestation and dissonance, and to sustain local people’s livelihoods and enhance their life quality. This would be conducive to the overall sustainability of the heritage resource. Using Mount Taishan, a UNESCO world heritage site in China, as a case study, employing a plan and implementation evaluation approach, and taking a community perspective, this thesis evaluates the plans for the world heritage site and their implementation from three perspectives: resource conservation, visitor experience and local well-being (particularly local involvement in, and benefit from tourism). A mixture of quantitative and qualitative research methods is used and the transferability and applicability of western heritage planning and evaluation methods to China is examined implicitly. It is shown that much attention has been placed on resource conservation on this world heritage site, although the desire for economic returns underpins the conservation. The resource integrity of the heritage mountain has been marred by the construction of several cable cars for tourism. The number of visitors keeps growing. However, visitor experiences are generally positive except for crowding during the high seasons and length of stay has decreased. Local involvement in decision making relating to heritage operations is low. Local involvement in the provision of tourism services is high but uneven, and usually under the organization of the village committees. Faced with land loss, displacement, and livelihood change, villagers are very positive toward and very much dependent on tourism as the major or sole means of making a living. The power-relations that are reflected in the heritage nexus are a key issue. As the most powerful stakeholder, the local government’s intervention produces high efficiency and also inequity. Short-term goals are sought, reflecting the short tenure of officials. Within this context, western heritage planning ideas, including the advocacy of community involvement and public participation, have met many challenges in China, although this could change with socio-political developments in China.

The concept of heritage is full of conflicts and contestations. The UNESCO’s intervention in the form of the “World Heritage Convention” enriches the meaning of heritage but may exacerbate the intrinsic tensions in heritage while expanding its economic significance through tourism. Heritage tourism is an effective means to realize the economic potential of heritage. This is a major reason why developing countries like China apply for UNESCO world heritage designation. However, some stakeholders take more benefits while others bear more costs in the interplay of heritage conservation and tourism. Achievement of a balance among resource conservation, tourism development, and local community well-being is a pressing challenge for planning and management of World Heritage Sites. This research examines the implications of World Heritage designation for conservation of the world heritage and, particularly, for the lives of local people living in and around the site. It is argued that such people often bear the most costs while often being ignored or disadvantaged in terms of benefits. Sustainability of local life is interdependent with sustainability of heritage conservation and tourism. A key goal of heritage planning should be to mitigate heritage contestation and dissonance, and to sustain local people’s livelihoods and enhance their life quality. This would be conducive to the overall sustainability of the heritage resource. Using Mount Taishan, a UNESCO world heritage site in China, as a case study, employing a plan and implementation evaluation approach, and taking a community perspective, this thesis evaluates the plans for the world heritage site and their implementation from three perspectives: resource conservation, visitor experience and local well-being (particularly local involvement in, and benefit from tourism). A mixture of quantitative and qualitative research methods is used and the transferability and applicability of western heritage planning and evaluation methods to China is examined implicitly. It is shown that much attention has been placed on resource conservation on this world heritage site, although the desire for economic returns underpins the conservation. The resource integrity of the heritage mountain has been marred by the construction of several cable cars for tourism. The number of visitors keeps growing. However, visitor experiences are generally positive except for crowding during the high seasons and length of stay has decreased. Local involvement in decision making relating to heritage operations is low. Local involvement in the provision of tourism services is high but uneven, and usually under the organization of the village committees. Faced with land loss, displacement, and livelihood change, villagers are very positive toward and very much dependent on tourism as the major or sole means of making a living. The power-relations that are reflected in the heritage nexus are a key issue. As the most powerful stakeholder, the local government’s intervention produces high efficiency and also inequity. Short-term goals are sought, reflecting the short tenure of officials. Within this context, western heritage planning ideas, including the advocacy of community involvement and public participation, have met many challenges in China, although this could change with socio-political developments in China.

No description available.

No description available.

The purpose of this project is to evaluate the response of coastal community comprehensive plans to the threats posed by sea level rise. The communities evaluated are Chincoteague, VA, Ocean City, MD, and Rehoboth Beach, DE. The results of the evaluations illustrate to what extent these communities are prepared to deal with sea level rise and provide a basis for recommendations to improve plan quality. The level of community risk and the components of the individual comprehensive plans are evaluated using new models created for this project. Risk level is measured using computer disaster simulations, topographic and demographic data. The plan evaluation criteria include standard plan quality benchmarks and hazard mitigation and adaptation elements suggested by numerous agencies and resources. The plan evaluations range in quality from “poor” to “excellent”. These evaluations will be used to create policy strategies and recommendations for addressing the threat of sea level rise.

The aim of my Master's Thesis is to estimate the value of the FERN company at 1st May, 2012. The thesis is divided into two main parts. The first one contains the main theoretical principles, which create a basis for the evaluation of the company. In the second part I present the company beeing evaluated. Futher I focus my attention on the strategic and financial analysis, which is the fundamental basis for the determination of the final value. The following part of my thesis includes the generators of values and the forecast of them. The financial plan is constructed coming out of those generators of values. To determine the value of the company I chose the method of discounted cash flow to the equity.

Ce travail contribue à développer des méthodes de résolution associées à la méthode de simulation MMP (Model of Manufactured Part) développée par F.Vignat et F.Villeneuve. Le MMP est un modèle générique 3D des défauts géométriques engendrés sur les pièces fabriquées par un processus de fabrication donné. Ce modèle permet de générer un ensemble de pièces virtuellement fabriquées incluant les incertitudes de fabrication et permet par conséquent de mener l'analyse de tolérances fonctionnelles. Les méthodes de résolution développées autour du MMP permettent aux ingénieurs de fabrication d'évaluer une gamme de fabrication candidate du point de vue géométrique. Le développement des méthodes de résolution s'est effectué selon 2 axes. Le premier axe consiste à développer des méthodes pour la recherche du pire des cas (WCTA). La première approche de cet axe utilise des méthodes d'optimisation (SQP pour Sequential Quadratic Programming et GA pour les algorithmes génétiques) basées sur la recherche du pire des cas. La recherche du pire des cas consiste en un algorithme d'optimisation multicouche comportant deux boucles principales. La deuxième approche de cet axe consiste à faire une adaptation de la méthode du torseur des petits déplacements avec intervalle (modèle Jacobien Torseur développé au Canada) à la méthode MMP. Le deuxième axe concerne les méthodes stochastiques permettant une simulation de production d'un ensemble de pièces et l'analyse des résultats d'un point de vue statistique. La méthode stochastique est basée sur une méthode de tirage aléatoire sous contraintes. Les différentes approches sont finalement comparées entre elles.

Försvarsmaktens budget blir allt mindre, detta innebär att man inte kan öva i samma omfattning med riktig ammunition och fordon. Intresset för digitala krigsspel och simulationer har därmed ökat. Men för att använda sig av spel i utbildning måste man veta hur man skall använda dem. Syftet med uppsatsen har således varit att undersöka om man kan använda sig av digitala krigsspel i sig självt som en bärare för lärande. Kan deltagarna lära sig taktik genom att bara spela ett spel? Det finns flera olika synsätt som stöder alternativt motbevisar om hur lärande sker då man använder sig av spel för lärande. Uppsatsen kommer att fokusera på två av dessa teorier, Ett experiment genomfördes för att undersöka om spelet i sig kunde öka kvalitén på de taktiska planerna som togs fram. Experimentet gick ut på att två grupper fick ta fram en taktisk plan på plutons nivå, en av grupperna fick även genomföra ett digitalt krigsspel på ett liknande scenario innan. Resultatet av bedömningen av planerna resulterade inte i någon signifikant skillnad mellan grupperna. Vad man däremot kunde se var att spelet hade en annan inverkan på deltagarna. / The Swedish Armed Forces’ budget is getting smaller, that means a lot less practice with real ammunitions and vehicles. Because of this, the interest for digital war games and simulations has increased.  But to use games in education you need to know how you are going to implement them. The purpose with this paper has been to examine the possibility of only using a digital war game for learning. Will the participants learn tactics by just playing a game? The impact this could have is that learners could bring the game home and train whenever they wanted to. There are several views that support and reject the idea of using gamebased learning. This paper will focus on describing two of these theories.  An experiment was done to examine if the digital game itself could increase the quality of the tactical plans that the participants had made. The experiment had two groups which had an assignment to make a tactical plan on a platoon level, one of the groups also got to play a digital war game before they made the tactical plan. The assessment of the plans was made by a tactical teacher at the Defense Collage and the results of the assessment did not give any results that showed any significant difference from the groups. The game itself did not have any impact on the quality of the plan. But there were indications that the game might have had other impact on its participants.