Managing ubiquitous eco cities: the role of urban telecommunication infrastructure networks and convergence technologies

A successful urban management system for a Ubiquitous Eco City requires an integrated approach. This integration includes bringing together economic, socio-cultural and urban development with a well orchestrated, transparent and open decision making mechanism and necessary infrastructure and technologies. Rapidly developing information and telecommunication technologies and their platforms in the late 20th Century improves urban management and enhances the quality of life and place. Telecommunication technologies provide an important base for monitoring and managing activities over wired, wireless or fibre-optic networks. Particularly technology convergence creates new ways in which the information and telecommunication technologies are used. The 21st Century is an era where information has converged, in which people are able to access a variety of services, including internet and location based services, through multi-functional devices such as mobile phones and provides opportunities in the management of Ubiquitous Eco Cities. This paper discusses the recent developments in telecommunication networks and trends in convergence technologies and their implications on the management of Ubiquitous Eco Cities and how this technological shift is likely to be beneficial in improving the quality of life and place. The paper also introduces recent approaches on urban management systems, such as intelligent urban management systems, that are suitable for Ubiquitous Eco Cities

Remote Real-Time Collaboration Platform enabled by the Capture, Digitisation and Transfer of Human-Workpiece Interactions

In this highly globalised manufacturing ecosystem, product design and verification activities, production and inspection processes, and technical support services are spread across global supply chains and customer networks. Therefore, a platform for global teams to collaborate with each other in real-time to perform complex tasks is highly desirable. This work investigates the design and development of a remote real-time collaboration platform by using human motion capture technology powered by infrared light based depth imaging sensors borrowed from the gaming industry. The unique functionality of the proposed platform is the sharing of physical contexts during a collaboration session by not only exchanging human actions but also the effects of those actions on the task environment. This enables teams to remotely work on a common task problem at the same time and also get immediate feedback from each other which is vital for collaborative design, inspection and verifications tasks in the factories of the future

Philadelphia Before I-95: Uncovering the Lost Wealth and Neighborhoods Destroyed by the Delaware Expressway

This case study investigates the demolished structures and lost wealth due to the construction of the Delaware Expressway (I-95) along Philadelphia’s Center City waterfront. The history of the Delaware Expressway is embedded in a larger freeway-building era in the United States that led to the destruction of urban neighborhoods throughout the country. Yet the neighborhoods that once occupied these corridors have fallen out of the collective memory, and there exists a lack of research analyzing the original conditions of these areas before freeways permanently changed them. This thesis seeks to understand the historical context of freeways in the United States that led to the construction of the Delaware Expressway, calculate the tax revenue potential if the residential dwellings in this corridor still existed today, and digitally recreate one of the impacted neighborhoods, Southwark, in a 3D environment. By using a comparatives sales method, the results of the fiscal analysis determined that the current tax value of these dwellings would be $8.23 million annually if the structures still existed today. This historical perspective is especially relevant given the passage of the 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, which authorizes a level of funding unseen since the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956. As transportation planning in the United States enters the next chapter of its history, this research provides an important analysis and historical context of how freeways impacted the built environment during 1950s-1970s in order to better guide transportation infrastructure going forward

State — Region — Branch — Enterprise: System Sustainability Framework of the Russian Economy

This paper investigates sustainability factors of the Russian economy as a multi-level, multi-entity and multi-aspect socio-economic system from the system perspective. The economic system sustainability concept is formulated as an ability to maintain preconditions for the development by supporting and effective using of economic system structure. The leading role of the community of economic entities at different levels (including the state as the entity of international relations, regions as the entities of Federation, enterprises as the business entities) in the economic sustainability is demonstrated. The necessity of the economic entity network “extension” by strengthening the sustainability of economic sectors is emphasized. The research into the internal basic system structure of an economic entity and external structure of its immediate surroundings in socio-economic, administrative-and-managerial and market environments using the results of the new economic systems theory contributes the evidence of the similarity of these structures to the conclusion. It is shown that each of the systems includes (together with an entity itself) four systems of different types (object, environment, process and project). The entity’s system environment has the same structure in administrative-and-managerial interlevel interactions. This makes it possible to combine the problem of the entity’s sustainability and the issue of the balanced system structures forming the economic entities’ internal and external environments. The method of calculating the index of such balanced systems is given. Recommendations on the selection of economic policy measures aimed at ensuring system sustainability of the Russian economy in the period of crisis are provided. It is shown that such a policy should be carried out in accordance with the principles of economic entity protection; balanced system of the economic entities’ internal and external environment; economic entities’ corporate solidarity regardless of their level in the management hierarchy.This article is supported by the Russian Science Foundation grant, project No. 14-18-02294