In dieser Arbeit wird eine Methode vorgestellt, die erstmalig die durch Staus verursachten Verzögerungszeiten auf Bundesautobahnen mithilfe von Annahmen aus der Verkehrsflussdynamik zu schätzen versucht. Dies geschieht anhand einer GPS-gestützten Vollerhebung aller Staus aus den Jahren 2015 und teils auch 2016, welche vom Navigationsdienstleister TomTom zur Verfügung gestellt wurden. Es konnte gezeigt werden, dass für das Jahr 2015 rund 190 Mio. Fahrzeug-Stunden (Anzahl betroffener Fahrzeuge × Staustunden) anfielen, was für die betroffenen Autofahrer einen monetären Wert von ca. vier Milliarden Euro ausmachte. Es wurden zudem Engpässe anhand eines Rankings erstellt, womit dauerhafte Schwerpunkte auf Autobahnen aufgedeckt wurden. Unter einer konkret definierten räumlichen, zeitlichen und sachlichen Abgrenzungen kann diese Methodik sowohl für die Forschung als auch für die Weiterentwicklung von Navigationsdiensten dienen. / The estimation of time losses caused by traffic congestions have not previously been assessed by using assumptions of traffic flow dynamics. With a GPS-supported full survey of all jams from the year 2015 and parts of 2016 this master thesis tries to quantify the additional (congested) travel time on German Motorways. The analysis has shown that all jams reported on German highways produced time losses over 190 million vehicle-hours (amount of involved vehicles × congestion hours), which equals a monetary value of four billion euros for the involved drivers. Furthermore the ranking of the respective bottlenecks has been developed over the year and main congestion hotspots on motorways have been revealed. By using a precisely defined local, temporal and objective delimitation, this method could be used for further research and developments of navigation services as well.

Birds are a key environmental asset and this is recognised through comprehensive legislation and policy ensuring their protection and conservation. Many species are active at night and surveys are required to understand the implications of proposed developments such as towers and reduce possible conflicts with these structures. Night vision devices are commonly used in nocturnal surveys, either to scope an area for bird numbers and activity, or in remotely sensing an area to determine potential risk. This thesis explores some practical and theoretical approaches that can improve the accuracy, confidence and efficiency of nocturnal bird surveillance. As image intensifiers and thermal imagers have operational differences, each device has associated strengths and limitations. Empirical work established that image intensifiers are best used for species identification of birds against the ground or vegetation. Thermal imagers perform best in detection tasks and monitoring bird airspace usage. The typically used approach of viewing bird survey video from remote sensing in its entirety is a slow, inaccurate and inefficient approach. Accuracy can be significantly improved by viewing the survey video at half the playback speed. Motion detection efficiency and accuracy can be greatly improved through the use of adaptive background subtraction and cumulative image differencing. An experienced ornithologist uses bird flight style and wing oscillations to identify bird species. Changes in wing oscillations can be represented in a single inter-frame similarity matrix through area-based differencing. Bird species classification can then be automated using singular value decomposition to reduce the matrices to one-dimensional vectors for training a feed-forward neural network.

This research provides an example delay calculation for long-haul single unit and combination trucks on Interstate-75 (I-75) in Georgia. Truck profiles on Georgia interstates are used to calculate the value of freight by truck type and commodity moved. Determining the types of trucks and commodities moved within the state of Georgia allows the researcher to monetize the effect of recurring congestion by location in addition to the cost of lost time. A more accurate calculation of delay based on truck type and commodity moved will better inform the Georgia Department of Transportation about the performance of Georgia's major truck routes and its potential effect on the local economy. A review of past research on this topic found that the calculated cost of delay in previous studies varied widely based on truck and commodity type. The identification of the types of commodities moved can assist in better monetizing the value of truck freight. Using forecast data on future truck traffic volume increases in the corridor, the growing importance of putting a value on different types of truck freight delay costs are demonstrated.

In detaile, this projects focuses on object's far and near past and memories and brings their history into present exposition. Therefor the concept captures a new perception and observation of the importance of art history, using the still life art form and Vanitas theme and objects to symbolize the impermanence and transience time. However the main focus is not only on the objects themselves but also on their environment as a source of inspiration and cultural memory. This approach links the methods of displaying objects in the contemporary art with the current methods in art education. The didactic part reflects the attitude of pupils aged 14-15 to the objects from the distant and recent past and their values. As the result the artworks are a combination of graphic prints with fragments of photographs depicting snatches of memories, which has been moderately used as a hidden layer to properly reflect the author's perspective.

This dissertation explores the relationship between people’s conceptualisation and use of time in everyday life against the background of the political economy of the late modern welfare state. The main focus lies upon their evaluation of different time-uses in order to approach a better understanding of the moral economy of time. Special consideration is given to the role of commodification of time and the experience of time scarcity. Another topic investigated is the association of time with the striving for ecological sustainability in everyday live. The study is based upon three empirical materials. The first one consists of a subset of Statistic Sweden’s time-use database for inhabitants of Stockholm. The other two materials are qualitative interview studies. One was conducted with 85 unemployed people in Sörmland and Jämtland, the other with 45 inhabitants of Stockholm. The interviewees in the latter study were asked to consider two options for the future of welfare politics in Sweden: increasing wages combined with the same work hours as today or a substantial decrease in working hours accompanied by stagnating wages. Many interviewees consider time scarcity to be an important issue that needs to be integrated into the traditional concept of welfare. Time conflicts in everyday life, also regarding the choice of sustainable options, are solved with a certain moral flexibility still dominated by work ethics. Some interviewees try to articulate counter-images to the commodified concept of time by challenging traditional conceptions of the value of time and envision an ecological sound time use. These attempts draw attention to the importance of temporal commons such as vacations and also the need for a conscious time-politics in order to strengthen temporal welfare.

Managed lane refers to the application of various operational and design strategies on highway facilities to improve system efficiency and mobility by proactively allocating traffic capacity to different lanes. One of the key elements to understand the behavior changes and underlying causalities in user responses to managed lanes is to examine the value of time (VOT) and value of reliability (VOR). The breadth of this dissertation encompasses two major dimensions of VOT and VOR estimation – distributions or variations across different users and under different circumstances; and influences of unobserved attitudinal characteristics on roadway pricing valuation. To understand travelers’ choice behavior regarding the usage of managed lanes, combined revealed preference (RP) and stated preference (SP) data were used in this study. Mixed logit modeling was applied as the state of the art methodology to capture heterogeneity in users’ choice behavior. The model revealed an average value of $10.68 per hour for VOT and $13.91 per hour for VOR, which are reasonable considering the average household income in the region, and are well within the ranges found in the literature. In terms of user heterogeneity, the mixed logit model was further enhanced by adding interaction effects of variables, which helped recognize and quantify potential sources of heterogeneity in user sensitivities to time, reliability, and cost. The findings indicated that travelers were likely to exhibit higher willingness to pay when they were female, younger (years), older (>54 years), had higher income (> 50 K), driving alone, and traveled on weekdays. Attitudinal aspects are rarely incorporated into roadway pricing analysis. The study herein presents an effort to explore the role of attitudinal factors in drivers’ propensity toward using managed lanes. Model results boded for a significant contribution of attitudinal parameters in the model, both in terms of coefficients and model performance. This study provides a robust approach to quantify user heterogeneity in VOT and VOR and capture the impacts of attitudinal attributes in pricing valuation. The results of this study contribute to a better understanding on what attributes lead to higher or lower VOT and VOR and to what extent.

In dieser Arbeit wird eine Methode vorgestellt, die erstmalig die durch Staus verursachten Verzögerungszeiten auf Bundesautobahnen mithilfe von Annahmen aus der Verkehrsflussdynamik zu schätzen versucht. Dies geschieht anhand einer GPS-gestützten Vollerhebung aller Staus aus den Jahren 2015 und teils auch 2016, welche vom Navigationsdienstleister TomTom zur Verfügung gestellt wurden. Es konnte gezeigt werden, dass für das Jahr 2015 rund 190 Mio. Fahrzeug-Stunden (Anzahl betroffener Fahrzeuge × Staustunden) anfielen, was für die betroffenen Autofahrer einen monetären Wert von ca. vier Milliarden Euro ausmachte. Es wurden zudem Engpässe anhand eines Rankings erstellt, womit dauerhafte Schwerpunkte auf Autobahnen aufgedeckt wurden. Unter einer konkret definierten räumlichen, zeitlichen und sachlichen Abgrenzungen kann diese Methodik sowohl für die Forschung als auch für die Weiterentwicklung von Navigationsdiensten dienen.:1. Einleitung 1 2. Aspekte der Stauforschung 3 2.1. Was ist ein Stau? 3 2.2. Stauentstehung 5 2.3. Ausbreitung und Auflösung von Staus 6 3. Datengrundlage und Analysemethoden 9 3.1. Datengrundlage 9 3.2. Formalitäten 10 3.3. Java-Methodiken zur Datenaufbereitung 12 4. Verlustzeiten durch Staus und die Höhe ihrer Kosten 17 4.1. Berechnungsergebnisse und Interpretation 17 4.2. Quantifizierung der Staukosten 18 5. Referenz zu einer externen Staustudie 23 5.1. Staustudie der Inrix UK Ltd. 23 5.2. Diskussion und Würdigung der Berechnungsergebnisse 26 6. Visualisierung des Stauaufkommens 29 6.1. Staumeldungen im Wochenverlauf 29 6.2. Engpässe im Jahr 2015 31 6.3. Top Engpässe im quartalsweisen Vergleich 34 6.4. Zwischenfazit 36 7. Schlussfolgerungen und Ausblick 37 7.1. Zusammenfassung der Ergebnisse 37 7.2. Weitere Forschungsmöglichkeiten 38 A. Inrix Städteranking IX / The estimation of time losses caused by traffic congestions have not previously been assessed by using assumptions of traffic flow dynamics. With a GPS-supported full survey of all jams from the year 2015 and parts of 2016 this master thesis tries to quantify the additional (congested) travel time on German Motorways. The analysis has shown that all jams reported on German highways produced time losses over 190 million vehicle-hours (amount of involved vehicles × congestion hours), which equals a monetary value of four billion euros for the involved drivers. Furthermore the ranking of the respective bottlenecks has been developed over the year and main congestion hotspots on motorways have been revealed. By using a precisely defined local, temporal and objective delimitation, this method could be used for further research and developments of navigation services as well.:1. Einleitung 1 2. Aspekte der Stauforschung 3 2.1. Was ist ein Stau? 3 2.2. Stauentstehung 5 2.3. Ausbreitung und Auflösung von Staus 6 3. Datengrundlage und Analysemethoden 9 3.1. Datengrundlage 9 3.2. Formalitäten 10 3.3. Java-Methodiken zur Datenaufbereitung 12 4. Verlustzeiten durch Staus und die Höhe ihrer Kosten 17 4.1. Berechnungsergebnisse und Interpretation 17 4.2. Quantifizierung der Staukosten 18 5. Referenz zu einer externen Staustudie 23 5.1. Staustudie der Inrix UK Ltd. 23 5.2. Diskussion und Würdigung der Berechnungsergebnisse 26 6. Visualisierung des Stauaufkommens 29 6.1. Staumeldungen im Wochenverlauf 29 6.2. Engpässe im Jahr 2015 31 6.3. Top Engpässe im quartalsweisen Vergleich 34 6.4. Zwischenfazit 36 7. Schlussfolgerungen und Ausblick 37 7.1. Zusammenfassung der Ergebnisse 37 7.2. Weitere Forschungsmöglichkeiten 38 A. Inrix Städteranking IX

The Covid-19 pandemic resulted in organizations rapidly shifting from physical- to virtual meetings to keep their business going. However, with this came challenges and efficiency problems that organizations were not aware of. This master thesis focuses on identifying and finding potential solutions to reduce non-value-added time in virtual meetings. This was accomplished by studying Lynk & Co, a rapidly growing startup. Data was collected via a company-wide survey. The data was quantitatively analyzed using both univariate, bivariate, and multivariate methods as well as qualitatively analyzed using a thematic analysis approach. The quantitative results showed that 35,2% of the total Hours in meetings per day are hours wasted, this translates to 16% wasted hours per 8 hour work day. Additionally, the quantitative results showed that five independent variables affect the Wasted hours in virtual meetings per day. These were Hours in meetings per day, Key persons not attending the meeting, The meeting could have been replaced with an email,  Focusing on the meeting (I.e., not multitasking), and Being active in the discussions during the meeting. The qualitative results showed that the majority of the respondents highlighted either the same or similar problems and solutions regarding the virtual meeting inefficiencies. These were lack of agendas and insufficient meeting follow-ups. This concludes that the major root cause of the wasted time in virtual meetings was found to be inadequate meeting information combined with inadequate information regarding the work responsibilities of the employees. This resulted in two main recommendations for reducing non-value-added time in virtual meetings in a rapidly growing startup. These are (1) developing an internal meeting policy and (2) incorporating more detailed employee information in the virtual meeting communication software. / Covid-19 pandemin har resulterat i att organisationer har varit tvungna att börja använda virtuella möten istället för fysiska möten. Detta har inneburit utmaningar och effektivitetsproblem som inte tidigare varit kända. Det här examensarbetet ämnar att hitta potentiella förbättringar för att reducera icke-effektiv tid i virtuella möten. Detta åstadkoms genom att undersöka Lynk & Co, ett snabbväxande startup. Både kvantitativ- och kvalitativ data samlades in genom en enkät som skickades ut till de anställda på Lynk & Co. Vid den kvantitativa analysen användes både univariata-, bivariata- och multivariata- metoder och vid den kvalitativa analysen användes en tematisk analys. Resultatet av den kvantitativa analysen visade på att 35,2% av totala tiden i möten per dag är slösad tid, vilket representerar 16% slösad tid per 8 timmars arbetsdag. Vidare visade resultatet av den kvantitativa analysen på att det var fem variabler som påverkade slösad tid i virtuella möten per dag. Dessa var mötestimmar per dag, nyckelpersoner dök ej upp till mötet, mötet kunde ha blivit utbytt mot ett mail, fokus under mötet (I.e., inte multitaska) , och vara aktiv i diskussionerna under mötet. Resultatet av den kvalitativa analysen visade på att majoriteten av respondenterna var enade i de problem som påverkar tidsslöseri i virtuella möten. Dessa var brist på agendor och att virtuella möten hade otillräckliga uppföljningar. Slutsatsen blev därefter att den huvudsakliga rotorsaken av slösad tid i virtuella möten är brist på mötesinformation kombinerat med en brist av information gällande de anställdas arbetsansvar. Detta resulterade i två rekommendationer för att reducera slösad tid i virtuella möten i ett snabbt växande startup. Dessa är (1) skapa en intern mötespolicy och (2) inkorporera mer detaljerad information gällande de anställdas arbetsansvar i det virtuella mötesprogrammet som används inom organisationen.

Value pricing is now an accepted strategy for congestion and demand management in metropolitan areas. Along with alternate congestion management strategies, many transportation agencies have started looking at value pricing as a method to help financial shortfalls of new congestion management projects. Value pricing allows revenue collected from toll facilities to reduce operational concerns with underutilized High Occupancy Vehicle (HOV) facilities and relieves environmental concerns by reducing travel demand. Recently, transportation agencies have become increasingly interested in a high-occupancy toll (HOT) lane value pricing system with time-dependent tolls or dynamic tolls that change by the congestion level. However, there is a lack of proper travel demand forecasting tools that can evaluate and determine the impacts of pricing on travelers' decision in relation to congestion. The current methods use aggregated and zonal based approaches that lack the capability of tracing individual travelers through the supply network in order to capture his/her travel decisions as it pertains to the estimated cost for toll usage. The conventional models do not consider individual traveler socio-economic characteristics, particularly the heterogeneous value of time (VOT). TRANSIMS (Transportation Analysis Simulation System) differs from current travel demand forecasting methods in its underlying concepts and structure. These differences include a consistent and continuous representation of time, a detailed representation of persons and households, time-dependent routing, and a person-based Microsimulator. The TRANSIMS Microsimulator is the only simulation tool that maintains the identity of the traveler throughout the simulation and is capable of accessing the database of each individual (e.g., income, age, trip purpose). It traces the movement of people as well as vehicles on a second-by-second basis. Although TRANSIMS environment has significantly improved over the past few years, there are still issues that need to be improved upon including: the pricing of a HOT lane with dynamic tolls and the rescheduling of activities (i.e., departure time choice model) in response to network conditions. The primary objectives of this study are to improve functions of TRANSIMS by modifying source codes in order to utilize non-linear, individual VOT function in route choice of a HOT lane value pricing system, to implement 15-min dynamic tolls that vary by level of service (i.e., volume/capacity ratio) in the HOT lane(s) and to develop departure time choice model. Testing the proposed methodologies using real-world data as case studies and evaluating the impacts of dynamic tolls and/or departure time choice model are other objectives of this study. The test site of the HOT lane system is a segment of I-5 northbound from Hwy 217 to I-405 near the central business district (CBD) in Portland metropolitan region, Oregon. The experimental analyses of the application of dynamic tolls and individual VOT demonstrate the feasibility of the proposed simulation methodology. The outputs from the microscopic analysis clearly indicate the effectiveness of the analysis in scrutinizing travelers' route choice behavior based on different socio-economic and travel characteristics when different toll rates are applied. The effects of individual VOT on route choice are consistent with intuition; that is, travelers with higher VOTs are more likely to choose the HOT lane(s). In addition, the impacts of various tolls on route choice are analyzed on the basis of socio-economic and trip characteristics of each traveler. In addition to the development of the dynamic value pricing along with individual VOT, the departure time choice model is also developed. The proposed method is a post-processing of route choice and represents a sequential decision making process of travelers who want to depart early or late based on congestion, individual attributes and activity characteristics. This paper presents the results of a departure time choice model and its impacts on a HOT lane system using Portland, Oregon as a case study. The results show that 13.9% of households did change their departure time because of congestion and/or tolls. / Ph. D.

Cette thèse a pour objectif d’incorporer des éléments de théories de psychologie et d’économie comportementale dans des modèles de choix discret afin d’améliorer la compréhension du choix modal réalisé à l’échelle régionale. Les estimations se basent sur une enquête de type choice experiment présentée en première partie. Une deuxième partie s’intéresse à l’incorporation de variables latentes pour expliquer le choix modal. Après une revue de littérature sur les modèles de choix hybrides, c’est-à-dire des modèles combinant modèle d’équations structurelles et modèle de choix discret, un tel modèle est estimé pour montrer comment l’hétérogénéité d’outputs économiques (ici, la valeur du temps) peut être expliquée à l’aide de variables latentes (ici, le confort perçu dans les transports en commun) et de variables observables (ici, la garantie d’une place assise). La simulation de scénarios montre cependant que le gain économique (diminution de la valeur du temps) est plus élevé lorsque les politiques agissent sur des dimensions palpables que sur des dimensions latentes. S’appuyant sur un modèle de médiation, l’estimation d’un modèle d’équations structurelles montre par ailleurs que l’effet de la conscience environnementale sur les habitudes de choix modal est partiellement médié par l’utilité indirecte retirée de l’usage des transports en commun. Une troisième partie s’intéresse à deux formalisations de l’utilité issues de l’économie comportementale : 1) l’utilité dépendante au rang en situation de risque et 2) l’utilité dépendante à la référence. Dans un premier temps, un modèle d’utilité dépendante au rang est inséré dans des modèles de choix discret et, en particulier, un modèle à classes latentes, afin d’analyser l’hétérogénéité intra- et inter-individuelle lorsque le temps de déplacement n’est pas fiable. La probabilité de survenue d’un retard est sur-évaluée pour les déplacements en train et sous-évaluée pour les déplacements en voiture, en particulier pour les automobilistes, les usagers du train prenant d’avantage en compte l’espérance du temps de déplacement. Dans les modèles prenant en compte l’aversion au risque, les fonctions d’utilité sont convexes, ce qui implique une décroissance,de la valeur du temps. Dans un deuxième temps, une nouvelle famille de modèles de choix discret généralisant le modèle logit multinomial, les modèles de référence, est estimée. Sur mes données, ces modèles permettent une meilleure sélection des variables explicatives que le logit multinomial et l’estimation d’outputs économiques plus robustes, notamment en cas de forte hétérogénéité inobservée. La traduction économique des modèles de référence montre que les meilleurs modèles empiriques sont également les plus compatibles avec le modèle de dépendance à la référence de Tversky et Kahneman. / The objective of this thesis is to incorporate aspects of psychology and behavioral economics theories in discrete choice models to promote a better understanding of mode choice at regional level. Part II examines the inclusion of latent variables to explain mode choice. A literature review of integrated choice and latent variable models – that is, models combining a structural equation model and a discrete choice model – is followed by the estimation of an integrated choice and latent variable model to show how the heterogeneity of economic outputs (here, value of time) can be explained with latent variables (here, perceived comfort in public transport) and observable variables (here, the guarantee of a seat). The simulation of scenarios shows, however, that the economic gain (decrease in value of time) is higher when policies address tangible factors than when they address latent factors. On the basis of a mediation model, the estimation of a structural equation model furthermore implies that the influence of environmental concern on mode choice habits is partially mediated by the indirect utility derived frompublic transport use. Part III examines two utility formulations taken from behavioral economics: 1) rankdependent utility to model risky choices, and 2) reference-dependent utility. Firstly, a rank-dependent utility model is included in discrete choice models and, in particular, a latent-class model, in order to analyze intra- and inter-individual heterogeneity when the travel time is subject to variability. The results show that the probability of a delay is over-estimated for train travel and under-estimated for car travel, especially for car users, as train users are more likely to take into account the expected travel time. In the models that account for risk aversion, the utility functions are convex, which implies a decrease in value of time. Secondly, a new family of discrete choice models generalizing the multinomial logit model, the reference models, is estimated. On my data, these models allow for a better selection of explanatory variables than the multinomial logit model and a more robust estimation of economic outputs, particularly in cases of high unobserved heterogeneity. The economic formulation of reference models shows thatthe best empirical models are also more compatible with Tversky et Kahneman’s reference-dependent model.