Information sharing in sustainable value chain network (SVCN): Innovative technology for transportation in cities

A lack of information and understanding of transportation has a major role in most cities. Improving such information is important for information sharing in sustainable value chain network (SVCN) of transportation in these cities. The phenomenon of information sharing is one of the key subjects to be enabled by effective Information and Communications Technology (ICT) technologies such as Internet-of-Things (IoT) (Lindholm, 2010; Mirzabeiki, 2013; Andersson and Mattsson, 2015). Optimising the transportation activities with innovative ICT is considering smart solutions to support freight flow in urban cities due to the complexity of the processes taking place in transport systems and often conflicting expectations of stakeholders (Tachizawa et al., 2015). In fact, there are a great number of initiatives which are very close as for their objectives but they do not have a common basis like standards, conceptions and strategies (Vovk, 2016). Since 2000, more than 40 different projects on smart transportation have been initiated in Europe (Festag, 2014; Vovk, 2016). Nowadays, smart transportation of IoT includes not only a great variety of information but thousands of other systems using data to make intelligent transport-related decisions (Uden and He, 2017). IoT technologies guarantee economic benefits as chain actors will be able to share valuable information and make more reasonable decisions to reduce transportation time and transportation expenditures and to also reduce the impact of transportation on the society and environment (Haddud et al., 2017). With visions from a multi-disciplinary perspective, the IoT has become the common paradigm of modern ICT area by enabling innovative applications in nearly all sectors of economy (Haddud et al., 2017). However, relatively little attention has been paid to the information sharing between actors enabled by IoT for smart transportation along the SVCN (Andersson and Mattsson, 2015; Uden and He, 2017). Thus, this research aims to explore the high-order themes to information sharing in SVCN with a focus on the applications of IoT as a key enabling ICT innovative technology from the perception of expert community

A mirror with wings: Photography and the new era of communications

Simone Natale’s chapter, “A Mirror with Wings: Photography and the New Era of Communications,” questions how and to what extent photography participated in the transformations of the ways communication was conceived, administered, and used in middle-nineteenth century United States. Examining aspects of the medium’s reception of the period, he argues that this was related to improvements in communication and transportation technologies, and that photography was conceived, from the very beginning, as a medium of communication in the strictest sense of this term: a tool for putting images in movement in order to be carried, marketed, and transported

No Sinecure : William Young as Attorney General of Nova Scotia, 1854-1857

Focusing on the tenure (1854-1857) of William Young, this article examines the legal work of nineteenth-century Nova Scotian attorneys general. Although he served without the benefit of an established justice department, Young fulfilled a wide range of duties and completed an impressive volume of work, which required knowledge of both public and private law, and which demanded advocacy advisory, solicitorial, and legislative drafting skills. This article argues that though Young\u27s performance as a Crown prosecutor received the most public attention, his accomplishments outside the criminal courtroom, especially those relating to the administration ofjustice and legislative development, had the most significant and enduring effects upon the province, given their connection to the development of communications and transportation, as well as to the maintenance ofpublic orde

Generic Continuity of Operations/Continuity of Government Plan for State-Level Transportation Agencies, Research Report 11-01

The Homeland Security Presidential Directive 20 (HSPD-20) requires all local, state, tribal and territorial government agencies, and private sector owners of critical infrastructure and key resources (CI/KR) to create a Continuity of Operations/Continuity of Government Plan (COOP/COG). There is planning and training guidance for generic transportation agency COOP/COG work, and the Transportation Research Board has offered guidance for transportation organizations. However, the special concerns of the state-level transportation agency’s (State DOT’s) plan development are not included, notably the responsibilities for the entire State Highway System and the responsibility to support specific essential functions related to the State DOT Director’s role in the Governor’s cabinet. There is also no guidance on where the COOP/COG planning and organizing fits into the National Incident Management System (NIMS) at the local or state-level department or agency. This report covers the research conducted to determine how to integrate COOP/COG into the overall NIMS approach to emergency management, including a connection between the emergency operations center (EOC) and the COOP/COG activity. The first section is a presentation of the research and its findings and analysis. The second section provides training for the EOC staff of a state-level transportation agency, using a hybrid model of FEMA’s ICS and ESF approaches, including a complete set of EOC position checklists, and other training support material. The third section provides training for the COOP/COG Branch staff of a state-level transportation agency, including a set of personnel position descriptions for the COOP/COG Branch members

Implementation and Development of Vehicle Tracking and Immobilization Technologies

Since the mid-1980s, limited use has been made of vehicle tracking using satellite communications to mitigate the security and safety risks created by the highway transportation of certain types of hazardous materials. However, vehicle-tracking technology applied to safety and security is increasingly being researched and piloted, and it has been the subject of several government reports and legislative mandates. At the same time, the motor carrier industry has been investing in and implementing vehicle tracking, for a number of reasons, particularly the increase in efficiency achieved through better management of both personnel (drivers) and assets (trucks or, as they are known, tractors; cargo loads; and trailers). While vehicle tracking and immobilization technologies can play a significant role in preventing truck-borne hazardous materials from being used as weapons against key targets, they are not a & ”silver bullet.” However, the experience of DTTS and the FMCSA and TSA pilot projects indicates that when these technologies are combined with other security measures, and when the information they provide is used in conjunction with information supplied outside of the tracking system, they can provide defensive value to any effort to protect assets from attacks using hazmat as a weapon. This report is a sister publication to MTI Report 09-03, Potential Terrorist Uses of Highway-Borne Hazardous Materials. That publication was created in response to the Department of Homeland Security´s request that the Mineta Transportation Institute´s National Transportation Security Center of Excellence provide research and insights regarding the security risks created by the highway transportation of hazardous materials

The Role of Transportation in Campus Emergency Planning, MTI Report 08-06

In 2005, Hurricane Katrina created the greatest natural disaster in American history. The states of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama sustained significant damage, including 31 colleges and universities. Other institutions of higher education, most notably Louisiana State University (LSU), became resources to the disaster area. This is just one of the many examples of disaster impacts on institutions of higher education. The Federal Department of Homeland Security, under Homeland Security Presidential Directive–5, requires all public agencies that want to receive federal preparedness assistance to comply with the National Incident Management System (NIMS), which includes the creation of an Emergency Operations Plan (EOP). Universities, which may be victims or resources during disasters, must write NIMS–compliant emergency plans. While most university emergency plans address public safety and logistics management, few adequately address the transportation aspects of disaster response and recovery. This MTI report describes the value of integrating transportation infrastructure into the campus emergency plan, including planning for helicopter operations. It offers a list of materials that can be used to educate and inform campus leadership on campus emergency impacts, including books about the Katrina response by LSU and Tulane Hospital, contained in the report´s bibliography. It provides a complete set of Emergency Operations Plan checklists and organization charts updated to acknowledge lessons learned from Katrina, 9/11 and other wide–scale emergencies. Campus emergency planners can quickly update their existing emergency management documents by integrating selected annexes and elements, or create new NIMS–compliant plans by adapting the complete set of annexes to their university´s structures

Factors Influencing Voting Results of Local Transportation Funding Initiatives with a Substantial Transit Component: Case Studies of Ballot Measures in Eleven Communities, MTI Report 01-17

This publication is a follow-up study to MTI publication 00-01, Why Campaigns for Local Transportation Funding Initiatives Succeed or Fail: An Analysis of Four Communities and National Data. The earlier publication was case studies of four local ballot tax measures for transportation packages. The current study, Factors Influencing Voting Results of Local Transportation Funding Initiatives with a Substantial Rail Transit Component: Case Studies of Ballot Measures in Eleven communities, uses the same case study methodology as the prior study, and is expanded to 11 communities from the past four years. Some of the important conclusions identified by the study are as follows: 1) The combination of an energetic and credible opposition and a questionable reputation of the transit agency or transit system make it extremely difficult for a ballot measure to be successful; 2) When a community has no prior rail transit system, a comprehensive rail-only package is unlikely to be successful; 3)Without $1 million or more to spend on a combination of direct mail and television advertising it is difficult for proponents to be successful; 4) Developing a consensus transportation package depends on the specific details of the package and it is very difficult to generalize about the needed details; and 5) Under certain circumstances, voters do not appear to place significant importance on the existence or length of the expiration date of the tax used to fund the transportation package