Participation in postpolitical times: protesting WestConnex in Sydney, Australia

Arnstein’s work powerfully exposed the political framing work of government authorities in establishing how planners engage with the public, revealing how this tended to perpetuate rather than disrupt existing power relations. This resonates well with work on postpolitics, which argues that carefully stage-managed consultation exercises can be part of a repertoire of depoliticising techniques that allow the authorities to present their preferred plans and policies as the only ‘reasonable’ options around which a wide-ranging consensus can be built. The effect is to deny voice to those who dissent and refuse to compromise around an economic and political model that they see as broken. This article explores how governments have responded to criticism of participation by devising more sophisticated ways for ‘enhancing’ participation whilst ensuring it does not disrupt the existing distribution of power. Our research involves a case study of WestConnex, a controversial motorway being built in Sydney, Australia. Interviews were held with 25 key informants, supplemented by attending six public consultation and protest events. We also draw on a range of other material, from official documents and press releases to media coverage of WestConnex.<br/

Handover issues in autonomous driving: A literature review

The present review was undertaken to inform a workpackage of the Venturer Project undertaking studies into the handover of control between a human driver and an autonomous road vehicle. The ‘handover problem’ arises as a feature of the development of autonomous vehicles that are “highly” but not “fully” autonomous (DfT, 2015). As human error is a major cause of road accidents, contributing to over 90% of road collisions, removing the human operator would likely reduce their incidence. (DfT 2015; Reason, Manstead, Stradling, Baxter, & Cambell, 1990). However, levels of automation which do not completely eliminate the role for a driver can themselves provide problems for the human operator (Stanton and Marsden, 1996; Parasuraman & Manzey, 2010; Parasuraman & Riley, 1997), due to required tasks such as ‘handover’. The report considers the existing evidence on handover, identifying research gaps for handover particularly in urban areas, and considers the policy implications

E-fulfilment Systems for Quality Healthcare Delivery: A New Construct for Visualising and Designing

Electronically delivered information and funds transaction systems do offer such organisations great potential for efficiency and effectiveness, but many large integrated ICT systems, particularly in public service projects, have notoriously underperformed and disappointed. To ensure that quality is ‘engineered in’ a holistic, integrated and quality approach is required, and Total Quality Management (TQM) principles are the obvious foundations for this. TQM is a business philosophy that encourages an over-arching responsibility - both individual and collective - to quality and customer satisfaction. This paper describes a novel approach to viewing the operations of a healthcare provider where electronic means could be used to distribute information and facilitate electronic fund settlements, building around the Full Service Provider core. Specifically, an approach called the “triple pair flow” model is used to provide a view of healthcare delivery that is integrated, yet detailed, and that combines the strategic enterprise view with a business process view

A situated and embodied model of ant route navigation

This abstract summarises a model of route navigation inspired by the behaviour of ants presented fully in Baddeley et al. (2012). The ant's embodiment coupled with an innate scanning behaviour means that robust route navigation can be achieved by a parsimonious biologically plausible algorithm

The impact of superphosphate and surface-applied lime on the profitability and sustainability of wool production on the tablelands of NSW

Soil acidification is one of the major forms of soil degradation in higher rainfall areas of the tablelands of NSW. A grazing experiment was conducted near Sutton, NSW, to assess the effect of various rates of superphosphate, lime, sewage ash and stocking rates on wool production and sustainability between 1999 and 2008. The results from the discounted cash flow analysis show that the net present value of the treatment without lime, the lower rate of superphosphate and the lowest stocking rate returned the highest net present value of $266.30/ha. Raising the application of superphosphate from 125kg/ha every two to three years to 250kg/ha every year on un-limed and limed soil reduced the net present value by$278.70/ha and $249.30/ha, respectively. The addition of lime at the rate of 4t/ha on un-limed soil at the low superphosphate level reduced the net present value by about$234.60/ha. The net present value fell by $205.24/ha when the level of superphosphate rate increased to 250kg/ha every year. The net present value decreased as the level of stocking rate increased. We conclude that wool producers will be unlikely to use lime to ameliorate acid soil, even though production will not be sustainable, unless there are more favourable input and commodity prices in the market and government intervention.economic, acid soil, lime, superphosphate, sewage ash, stocking rate, policy,

Digital ethics, political economy and the curriculum: this changes everything

This chapter makes the case for a refocusing of teaching and learning across the curriculum on foundational questions about ethics in digital culture – and, hence, for reframing classroom practice around critical digital literacies. Our view is that a central aim of schooling now should be the interrogation of the forms and contents, practices and consequences of digital communications, and that the curriculum should engage developmentally and systematically with the current issues regarding everyday actions and their consequences, corporate and state surveillance, privacy and transparency, political and economic control and ownershi

Exploring design principles of biological and living building envelopes:What can we learn from plant cell walls?

A number of innovations in building envelope technologies have been implemented recently, for example, to improve insulation and air tightness to reduce energy consumption. However, growing concern over the embodied energy and carbon as well as resource depletion, is beginning to impact on the design and implementation of existing and novel building envelope technologies. Biomimicry is proposed as one approach to create buildings which are resilient to a changing climate, embedded in wider ecological systems, energy efficient and waste free. However, the diversity of form and function in biological organisms and therefore potential applications for biomimicry, requires a holistic approach spanning biology, materials science and architecture. It is considered timely to re-examine opportunities to learn from nature, including in the light of recent understanding of how plant form and function are determined at the cellular levels. In this article, we call for a systemic approach for the development of innovative biological and living building envelopes. Plant cell walls are compared to building envelopes. Key features of cell walls with the potential to inform the development of design principles ofPeer reviewe

Simulating river flow to the Baltic Sea from climate simulations over the past millennium

The aim of this study was to reconstruct river flow to the Baltic Sea using data from different periods during the past thousand years. A hydrological model coupled to simulations from climate models was used to estimate river flow. A "millennium" simulation of past climate from the ECHO-G coupled atmosphere-ocean global climate model provided climatological inputs. Results from this global model were downscaled with the RCA3 regional climate model over northern Europe. Temperature and precipitation from the downscaled simulation results were then used in the HBV hydrological model to simulate river flows to the Baltic Sea for the periods 1000-1199 and 1551-1929. These were compared with observations for the period 1921-2002. A general conclusion from this work is that although climate has varied during the past millennium, variability in annual river flow to the Baltic Sea does not appear more pronounced in recent years than during the previous millennium, or vice versa