The relationship between public and private bicycle use: the case of Seville

Despite the success achieved by Public Bicycle Sharing Systems (PBSS) across the world, several researchers provide evidence on their limitations and constraints in a medium-long term, and bicycle ownership may be considered as a complementary tool to promote a 'bicycle-culture'. This paper aims to cover the gap about the interaction between both systems (public bicycle / private bicycle) and which are the key aspects to explain the bicycle-buying decision. After a fieldwork based on surveys conducted in Seville (Spain), one of the cities currently acknowledged worldwide for its successful policy of promoting cycling, we apply a Discrete Choice Model. Our findings show that among the socio-demographic factors that favor the move from the PBSS to the private bicycle are: having a higher level of education, being more progressive ideologically-speaking, and being a resident of the city itself; while age and gender do not appear to be conclusive. Experienced users, for whom the bicycle is a part of his /her healthy lifestyle, state a greater willingness to buy a bicycle. And the main obstacles to make the jump from the PBSS to the private bicycle, and that any action plan to support private bicycle usage should take into account, are: the lack of proper parking at the origin/destination, and fear of theft

At a time of insurgent parties, can societies believe in election polls?. The Spanish experience

The main purpose of this paper is to use the Spanish case, through an econometric analysis of 226 electoral polls, to explain why polls are making more mistakes in times of great socioeconomic slumps, political instability and the emergence of new political parties. In this context, it is the very instrument with which society tries to reduce the reigning uncertainty that, paradoxically, can ultimately drive uncertainty up. Our results show that the prediction error for the new emerging parties is significantly higher than for the traditional parties and this error is not sensitive to solutions for increasing the reliability of surveys, such as increasing sample size, transparency constantly conducting periodical surveys, the closeness of the approaching election or the survey mode that is used. It can be observed that pollsters do not want to make predictions that vary greatly from the average of the other polls. Finally, editorial bias appears to play a significant role, especially in the case of traditional parties.El principal objetivo de este artículo es explicar por qué las encuestas electorales cometen más errores en épocas de crisis económica, inestabilidad política y con partidos emergentes como Podemos y Ciudadanos. Para ello utilizamos una base de datos de 226 encuestas previas a las elecciones generales españolas de 2016. En este contexto, paradójicamente vemos como el instrumento que la sociedad utiliza para reducir su incertidumbre puede acabar aumentándola. Nuestros resultados muestran como el error de predicción de los nuevos partidos es significativamente mayor que los tradicionales e insensible a las soluciones clásicas para aumentar la precisión de las encuestas, como el tamaño de la muestra, el método de muestreo, la experiencia del encuestador, o la proximidad de la cita electoral. Además, se observa que las empresas que desarrollan las encuestas realizan de forma sistemática predicciones muy próximas a las que han realizado las encuestas recientes de sus competidores. Finalmente, el sesgo editorial parece ser una variable relevante, especialmente en lo relativo a las predicciones de los partidos tradicionale

How can the effects of the introduction of a new airline on a national airline network be measured? A time series approach for the Ryanair case in Spain

This paper quantifies the Ryanair Effect on the Spanish airline network. It proposes new methodology based on an advanced time series approach that allows both the direct and indirect effects of the incorporation of a new airline to be measured and that can be easily extrapolated to other airport systems. The findings show the mean indirect effect on other airlines, in absolute value, is 8.6 per cent of the total airport traffic, peaking at a maximum of almost 29 per cent. Also, surprisingly, there is found to be a negative indirect effect at only four of the ten airports analysed

Complex adaptive systems, socio-ecological systems and resilience

The study and analysis of global risk increase from the environmental crisis resulting from a greater number of interactions and feedbacks between social, economic, political and environmental problems in different spatial and temporal scales require an interdisciplinary perspective that allows to learn in a holistic way the complexity of these problems and propose actions (change agenda) to increase the resilience and sustainability of development in all its dimensions. It strives for the usefulness of the complex adaptive systems approach to bring the study of resilience in social-ecological systems. To do this, the system dynamics from metaphors of adaptive cycles, panarchy and properties that determine these dynamics are described, highlighting the importance of the property called resilience. Think through increasing the resilience of local socio-ecological systems involves considering the dynamic of complex adaptive systems and conclude that this will require to carry out deep transformations at the level of economic and financial global practices, and neoliberal economic model which has fostered a culture of excessive consumption that far exceeds the thresholds necessary for human welfare.El estudio y análisis del incremento del riesgo global derivado de la crisis ambiental, consecuencia de un mayor número de interacciones y realimentaciones entre los problemas sociales, económicos, políticos y ecológicos a diferentes escalas espacio-temporales, requieren de una perspectiva interdisciplinaria que permita aprehender de manera integral la complejidad de estos problemas y proponer acciones (agendas de cambio) para incrementar la resiliencia y la sostenibilidad del desarrollo en todas sus dimensiones. Se pugna por la utilidad del enfoque de los sistemas complejos adaptativos para plantear el estudio de la resiliencia en los sistemas socio-ecológicos. Para ello, se describe la dinámica del sistema a partir de las metáforas de los ciclos adaptativos y la panarquía y las propiedades que determinan esas dinámicas, resaltando la importancia de la propiedad denominada resiliencia. Pensar en aumentar la resiliencia de los sistemas socioecológicos locales implica considerar la dinámica de los sistemas complejos adaptativos, y concluir que será necesario llevar a cabo profundas transformaciones a nivel de las prácticas económicas y financieras globales, y del modelo económico neoliberal que ha fomentado una cultura de consumo excesivo que rebasa por mucho los umbrales de lo necesario para el bienestar humano

Systematic determination of transcription factor DNA-binding specificities in yeast

International audienceUnderstanding how genes are regulated, decoding their "regulome", is one of the main challenges of the post-genomic era. Here, we describe the in vitro method we used to associate cis-regulatory sites with cognate trans-regulators by characterizing the DNA-binding specificity of the vast majority of yeast transcription factors using Protein Binding Microarrays. This approach can be implemented to any given organism

Institutional Capacity before the reduction of the disasters risk in Quintana Roo: Hyogo Framework for Action

El problema del riesgo de desastre en entornos urbanos o zonas costeras localizadas en franjas altamente propensas a la acción de fenómenos naturales es una de las temáticas prioritarias en la agenda global (ONU, 2000). La complejidad se presenta, principalmente, desde la perspectiva de la gestión pública para el manejo del riesgo por desastre y en el alcance de un desarrollo equilibrado.Evaluar el riesgo de desastres significa tener en cuenta no solamente el daño físico esperado, las víctimas o pérdidas económicas equivalentes, sino también factores sociales, organizacionales e institucionales. Actualmente, los avances logrados en la gestión del riesgo son diferentes para cada país. En México, tanto a nivel estatal como municipal existe una gran limitación en la información y carencias técnicas por parte de los responsables de estos procesos. El presente artículo tiene la finalidad de conocer la capacidad institucional ante la reducción del riesgo de desastres en el Estado de Quintana Roo aplicando una herramienta de evaluación cualitativa propuesta en el Marco de Acción de Hyogo (MAH)

Measuring the LCC effect on charter airlines in the Spanish airport system

Using a robust transfer function model methodology, the present paper seeks to offer empirical evidence regarding the size and type of effects that low-cost carriers (LCCs) have had on traffic for charter carriers (CCs) in the Spanish airport system by geographic market. We show an unmistakable substitution relationship between CCs and LCCs in the latter’s typical niche markets, national and European flights, while there is no reaction from the CCs in the segment of international flights outside the EU. Furthermore, substitution effects are smaller between CCs and LCCs on the domestic level than effects between LCCs and network carriers (NCs) and slightly larger on the European level. Lastly, CC traffic’s different sensitivity to terrorist attacks, day of the week, air accidents and the economic crisis is also evident. CCs should therefore be considered an independent category that warrants individualized analyses