8,714 research outputs found

    INTELLIGENTE TRANSPORT SYSTEMEN ITS EN VERKEERSVEILIGHEID

    Get PDF
    This report discusses Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS). This generic term is used for a broad range of information-, control- and electronic technology that can be integrated in the road infrastructure and the vehicles themselves, saving lives, time and money bymonitoring and managing traffic flows, reducing conges-tion, avoiding accidents, etc. Because this report was written in the scope of the Policy Research Centre Mobility & Public Works, track Traffic Safety, it focuses on ITS systems from the traffic safety point of view. Within the whole range of ITS systems, two categories can be distinguished: autonomous and cooperative systems. Autonomous systems are all forms of ITS which operate by itself, and do not depend on the cooperation with other vehicles or supporting infrastructure. Example applications are blind spot detection using radar, electronic stability control, dynamic traffic management using variable road signs, emergency call, etc. Cooperative systems are ITS systems based on communication and cooperation, both between vehicles as between vehicles and infrastructure. Example applications are alerting vehicles approaching a traffic jam, exchanging data regarding hazardous road conditions, extended electronic brake light, etc. In some cases, autonomous systems can evolve to autonomous cooperative systems. ISA (Intelligent Speed Adaptation) is an example of this: the dynamic aspect as well as communication with infrastructure (eg Traffic lights, Variable Message Sign (VMS)...) can provide additional road safety. This is the clear link between the two parts of this report. The many ITS applications are an indicator of the high expectations from the government, the academic world and the industry regarding the possibilities made possible by both categories of ITS systems. Therefore, the comprehensive discussion of both of them is the core of this report. The first part of the report covering the autonomous systems treats two aspects: 1. Overview of European projects related to mobility and in particular to road safety 2. Overview for guidelines for the evaluation of ITS projects. Out of the wide range of diverse (autonomous) ITS applications a selection is made; this selection is focused on E Safety Forum and PreVENT. Especially the PreVent research project is interesting because ITS-applications have led to a number of concrete demonstration vehicles that showed - in protected and unprotected surroundings- that these ITS-applications are already technically useful or could be developed into useful products. The component “guidelines for the evaluation of ITS projects” outlines that the government has to have specific evaluation tools if the government has the ambition of using ITS-applications for road safety. Two projects -guidelines for the evaluation of ITS projects- are examined; a third evaluation method is only mentioned because this description shows that a specific targeting of the government can be desirable : 1. TRACE describes the guidelines for the evaluation of ITS projects which are useful for the evaluation of specific ITS-applications. 2. FITS contains Finnish guidelines for the evaluation of ITS project; FIS is an adaptation of methods used for evaluation of transport projects. 3. The third evaluation method for the evaluation of ITS projects is developed in an ongoing European research project, eImpact. eImpact is important because, a specific consultation of stake holders shows that the social importance of some techniques is underestimated. These preliminary results show that an appropriate guiding role for the government could be important. In the second part of this document the cooperative systems are discussed in depth. These systems enable a large number of applications with an important social relevance, both on the level of the environment, mobility and traffic safety. Cooperative systems make it possible to warn drivers in time to avoid collisions (e.g. when approaching the tail of a traffic jam, or when a ghost driver is detected). Hazardous road conditions can be automatically communicated to other drivers (e.g. after the detection of black ice or an oil trail by the ESP). Navigation systems can receive detailed real-time up-dates about the current traffic situation and can take this into account when calculating their routes. When a traffic distortion occurs, traffic centers can immediately take action and can actively influence the way that the traffic will be diverted. Drivers can be notified well in advance about approaching emergency vehicles, and can be directed to yield way in a uniform manner. This is just a small selection from the large number of applications that are made possible because of cooperative ITS systems, but it is very obvious that these systems can make a significant positive contribution to traffic safety. In literature it is estimated that the decrease of accidents with injuries of fatalities will be between 20% and 50% . It is not suprising that ITS systems receive a lot of attention for the moment. On an international level, a number of standards are being established regarding this topic. The International Telecommunications Uniont (ITU), Institute for Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), International Organization for Standardization (ISO), Association of Radio Industries and Business (ARIB) and European committee for standardization (CEN) are currently defining standards that describe different aspects of ITS systems. One of the names that is mostly mentioned in literature is the ISO TC204/WG16 Communications Architecture for Land Mobile environment (CALM) standard. It describes a framework that enables transparent (both for the application and the user) continuous communication through different communication media. Besides the innumerable standardization activities, there is a great number of active research projects. On European level, the most important are the i2010 Intelligent Car Initiative, the eSafety Forum, and the COMeSafety, the CVIS, the SAFESPOT, the COOPERS and the SEVECOM project. The i2010 Intelligent Car Initiative is an European initiative with the goal to halve the number of traffic casualties by 2010. The eSafety Forum is an initiative of the European Commission, industry and other stakeholders and targets the acceleration of development and deployment of safety-related ITS systems. The COMeSafety project supports the eSafety Forum on the field of vehicle-to-vehicle and vehicle-to-infrastructure communication. In the CVIS project, attention is given to both technical and non-technical issues, with the main goal to develop the first free and open reference implementation of the CALM architecture. The SAFEST project investigates which data is important for safety applications, and with which algorithmsthis data can be extracted from vehicles and infrastructure. The COOPERS project mainly targets communication between vehicles and dedicated roadside infrastructure. Finally, the SEVECOM project researches security and privacy issues. Besides the European projects, research is also conducted in the United States of America (CICAS and VII projects) and in Japan (AHSRA, VICS, Smartway, internetITS). Besides standardization bodies and governmental organizations, also the industry has a considerable interest in ITS systems. In the scope of their ITS activities, a number of companies are united in national and international organizations. On an international level, the best known names are the Car 2 Car Communication Consortium, and Ertico. The C2C CC unites the large European car manufacturers, and focuses on the development of an open standard for vehicle-to-vehicle and vehicle-to-infrastructure communications based on the already well established IEEE 802.11 WLAN standard. Ertico is an European multi-sector, public/private partnership with the intended purpose of the development and introduction of ITS systems. On a national level, FlandersDrive and The Telematics Cluster / ITS Belgium are the best known organizations. Despite the worldwide activities regarding (cooperative) ITS systems, there still is no consensus about the wireless technology to be used in such systems. This can be put down to the fact that a large number of suitable technologies exist or are under development. Each technology has its specific advantages and disadvantages, but no single technology is the ideal solution for every ITS application. However, the different candidates can be classified in three distinct categories. The first group contains solutions for Dedicated Short Range Communication (DSRC), such as the WAVE technology. The second group is made up of several cellular communication networks providing coverage over wide areas. Examples are GPRS (data communication using the GSM network), UMTS (faster then GPRS), WiMAX (even faster then UMTS) and MBWA (similar to WiMAX). The third group consists of digital data broadcast technologies such as RDS (via the current FM radio transmissions, slow), DAB and DMB (via current digital radio transmissions, quicker) and DVB-H (via future digital television transmissions for mobiledevices, quickest). The previous makes it clear that ITS systems are a hot topic right now, and they receive a lot of attention from the academic world, the standardization bodies and the industry. Therefore, it seems like that it is just a matter of time before ITS systems will find their way into the daily live. Due to the large number of suitable technologies for the implementation of cooperative ITS systems, it is very hard to define which role the government has to play in these developments, and which are the next steps to take. These issues were addressed in reports produced by the i2010 Intelligent Car Initiative and the CVIS project. Their state of the art overview revealed that until now, no country has successfully deployed a fully operational ITS system yet. Seven EU countries are the furthest and are already in the deployment phase: Sweden, Germany, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Finland, Spain and France. These countries are trailed by eight countries which are in the promotion phase: Denmark, Greece, Italy, Austria, Belgium,Norway, the Czech Republic and Poland. Finally, the last ten countries find themselves in the start-up phase: Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Slovenia, Slovakia, Hungary, Portugal, Switzerland, Ireland and Luxembourg. These European reports produced by the i2010 Intelligent Car Initiative and the CVIS project have defined a few policy recommendations which are very relevant for the Belgian and Flemish government. The most important recommendations for the Flemish government are: ‱ Support awareness: research revealed that civilians consider ITS applications useful, but they are not really willing to pay for this technology. Therefore, it is important to convince the general public of the usefulness and the importance of ITS systems. ‱ Fill the gaps: Belgium is situated in the promotion phase. This means that it should focus at identifying the missing stakeholders, and coordinating national and regional ITS activities. Here it is important that the research activities are coordinated in a national and international context to allow transfer of knowledge from one study to the next, as well as the results to be comparable. ‱ Develop a vision: in the scope of ITS systems policies have to be defined regarding a large number of issues. For instance there is the question if ITS users should be educated, meaning that the use of ITS systems should be the subject of the drivers license exam. How will the regulations be for the technical inspection of vehicles equipped with ITS technology? Will ITS systems be deployed on a voluntary base, or will they e.g. be obliged in every new car? Will the services be offered by private companies, by the public authorities, or by a combination of them? Which technology will be used to implement ITS systems? These are just a few of the many questions where the government will have to develop a point of view for. ‱ Policy coordination: ITS systems are a policy subject on an international, national and regional level. It is very important that these policy organizations can collaborate in a coordinated manner. ‱ Iterative approach to policy development: developing policies for this complex matter is not a simple task. This asks for an iterative approach, where policy decisions are continuously refined and adjusted

    Linking two Instruments for a Better Innovation Policy-Mix: the French Case of the National Research Agency and the Competitiveness Clusters.

    Get PDF
    Since 2004, investigations and debates have been carried out on the French research and innovation system. Policy-makers have tried to break with the traditional ‘colbertist’ state- centered model, which put emphasis on interventionism and state involvement. This system that was successful until the 80ies, seems unfit to the increasingly competitive and knowledge-driven economy. The French model is also challenged by the changes in the policy context, as new actors such as regions, and constraints such as the Lisbon agenda are framing policy-making and implementation in the arena of research and innovation policies. The new Law for research aims at reforming the organisation of the research and innovation system, mostly by creating new structures, at the governance level, such as the National Research Agency (ANR), and at the research and innovation production level, such as the Competitiveness Clusters. The aim of this paper is to provide a case study that illustrates empirically the challenges of the setting up of these two new structures, and their difficulties to combine their actions. This qualitative research highlights the need for coordination and communication to reduce uncertainties and redundancies. Our work illustrates that the new organisation of the research and innovation system consists of creating more and more structures, without thinking in terms of policy-mix. A policy-mix perspective, that is to say a combination and balance of the different instruments would provide a better coordination between the different actors of the system.Policy-mix; National Innovation system; Clusters; National Research Agency; governance;

    I'M Information Market Issue No. 61 March-April 1990

    Get PDF

    ALT-C 2010 - Conference Introduction and Abstracts

    Get PDF

    ACII 2009: Affective Computing and Intelligent Interaction. Proceedings of the Doctoral Consortium 2009

    Get PDF

    Tribes & Cultures – Cross-disciplinary Communication: Pinpointing the Issues for eLearning

    Get PDF
    Effective communication and co-operation across disciplines is needed to create and deploy eLearning systems so that they contribute to enhanced outcomes for students and teachers. Using a Grounded Theory methodology we probed the cultures of the participating tribes: the Educationalists; the Instructional Designers; and the Information Technology Specialists. Six salient themes emerged from the semi-structured interview data of respondents selected from the three tribes, each of which is described in detail in this article. These themes give rise to Six Rules of Thumb to help promote fruitful communication and interaction among the tribes and cultures of eLearning system stakeholders, and thus result in improved eLearning systems

    Ease of use thematic research for S&V (project contracts)

    Get PDF

    The Economics of Music Production. The Narrow Paths for Record Companies to Enter the Digital Era

    Get PDF
    On the basis of an in depth analysis of the flow of revenues within the music industry and of the emerging practices, we attempt to understand the logic at play in the current evolution of the structure of the industry. We claim that the record companies used to play a role that was useful for the dynamic and for the quality of music production, and analyze whether it can be maintained despite the impossibility for them to further control the formation and distribution of revenues generated by recorded music. Two antagonistic strategies, corresponding to different segments of the market, are highlighted in this paper. One targets the mass market and relies on the recognition by the on-line distributors of the mutual dependency between them and the record companies. It also admits that this music is characterized by short commercial life cycles and that it should be marketed as a consumer product. Moreover revenues are not necessarily generated by sales, but by the value of temporally exclusive release in some channels. The second model targets the wide number of niches at the fringe of this mass market and relies on the building of communities of customers sharing common tastes and values and on the development of their loyalty. The model is commercial, but relies clearly on the cooperation among the various stakeholders that build a common safe harbor enabling specific types of music to sustainably develop. Value added services funded by ubscription have to be developed.economics of culture, cultural industries, digital business model, P2P, industrial organization.

    Design Considerations for the Integrated Delivery of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Depression:A User-Centered Design Study

    Get PDF
    Background: Adherence to computerized Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (cCBT) programs in real world settings can be poor and, in the absence of therapist support, effects are modest and short-term. Moreover, because cCBT systems tend towards limited support and thus low-intensity treatment, they are typically most appropriate for people with mild to moderate difficulties. Blended therapy, i.e. combining direct contact with a therapist with cCBT or psychoeducational materials, has been identified as one possible approach to addressing these limitations and widening access to individual CBT for depression. To date research on blended therapy systems is quite limited, particularly in comparison to more widely explored cCBT systems. While the design space and range of potential configurations for blended systems is large, only a small portion of this design space has been investigated to date. Objective: First, to explore patients’ and therapists’ views on using a system for the delivery of individual treatment for depression that integrates face-to-face contact with a therapist with access to online resources and with synchronous online therapy sessions that allow collaborative worksheet editing. Second, to establish design requirements and thus key design considerations for blended systems that further integrate different modes of communication. In particular, we were interested in exploring barriers relating to remote therapy and engagement with this type of treatment, understanding patients’ expectations of technology, and understanding therapists’ experiences of and attitudes towards the use of technology to support their work. Methods: We conducted design workshops and prototype testing sessions with 18 people who had received CBT for depression in the past, and qualitative interviews and role-play sessions with 12 CBT therapists experienced in the treatment of depression. Results: Workshops and prototyping sessions with people who had received CBT identified three important requirements for an integrated platform delivering CBT therapy for depression: 1) features that help to overcome depression-related barriers, 2) features that support engagement, and 3) features that reinforce learning and support the development of new skills. Research with therapists highlighted the importance of the therapist and client working together, the impact of technology on therapists’ workflow and workload, challenges and opportunities related to the use of online resources, and the potential of technology to support patient engagement. We use these findings to inform 12 design considerations for developing integrated therapy systems. Conclusions: To meet clients’ and therapists’ needs, integrated systems need to help retain the personal connection, support both therapist- and patient-led activities, provide access to materials and the ability to monitor progress. However, developers of such systems should be mindful of their capacity to disrupt current work practices and increase therapists’ workload. Future work should evaluate the impact of integrated systems on delivering and receiving therapy in a real-world context
    • 

    corecore