35,932 research outputs found
The Solent Disturbance & Mitigation Project Phase II – On-site visitor survey results from the Solent region
This report sets out the results of the on-site visitor survey component of the Solent Disturbance and Mitigation project. The work was commissioned by the Solent Forum in response to concerns over the impact of recreational pressure on features of the Solent SPA, SAC and Ramsar Sites. Of particular concern are the cumulative impacts of recreational use arising from potential new housing
developments in the Chichester District and South Hampshire.
The visitor surveys were conducted during the winter 2009/2010 to assess the level and type of visitor use at selected locations along the Solent coastline. Overall it is likely that the number of visitors interviewed and counted during the survey period was lower than would be normally be expected given the especially cold 2009/2010 winter. With that in mind, there is the potential that
the monitoring could provide an underestimate of the absolute number visitors to the region.
However, the interviews were designed to elicit generic and site specific details from visitors and
although fewer individuals may have been recorded or interviewed because of the weather we can
assume that the general winter visitation pattern remained similar and the results very useful in
understanding who, where, when and why people use the coast.
Counts of people and interviews were conducted at 20 locations around the Solent coastline
(including the north shore of the Isle of Wight). A total of 16 hours of surveys were carried out at
each location, split equally between weekend (8 hours) and a weekday (8 hours). A total of 784
interviews were conducted, accounting for 1,322 people and 550 dogs. The average group size was
1.7 people.
There were differences in visitor numbers between survey locations, with the highest visitor
numbers recorded at Emsworth (1088 visitors were recorded using the site over 16 hours) while
Lymington (Boldre/Pylewell) was the least busy (33 visitors counted over 16 hours). Visitor numbers
per day were typically highest on weekend compared to weekdays. Holiday makers accounted for
6% of the total number of visitors recorded (80 visitors). Visitors were undertook a wide range of
activities, with walking (without a dog) and dog walking the two most frequently recorded activities
(44% and 42% of interviews). Across all sites and activities, visits were typically short, with 89%
lasting less than two hours. The main modes of transport used to reach sites were by car and on
foot, with the proportion of people arriving by each mode varying between sites. Across all sites
(and taking the data for non-holiday makers only), 51% of interviewees arrived by car and a further
46% arrived on foot. Home postcodes were used to identify the distance between interviewee’s
home and the location where interviewed. Half of all visitors arriving on foot lived within 0.7km,
while half of all visitors arriving by car lived more than 4km away. Only 9% of foot visitors lived more
than 2km away compared to 80% of all car visitors.
Linear regressions using housing numbers within different distance bands of a location as a predictor
of visitor numbers for each location show a positive relationship between the number of houses
within 1km, 3km and 5km and number of visitors entering each survey location. Car park capacity at
the access points did not provide a good indication of the frequency of visitors arriving by car to each
location. The relationship is more complex, future modelling of visitor rates travelling to locations by
car should include potential road related parking (related to length of nearby roads around access
points) in addition to official and off road car parking capacity around the access points.
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Route data were also collected for each interview, with lines drawn directly on maps during the
survey. These route data were analysed to determine which activities take place below Mean High
Water Mark (MHWM) and how far different groups go out into the intertidal. Across all the
interviews, 7% of the mapped routes did not go within 25m of MHWM and were therefore visitors
who did not actually make it to the beach (in some locations the survey point was set inland, for
example near to parking locations etc.). A further 78% were entirely within the band between 25m
above and 25m below MHWM, indicating routes that remained at the top of the beach, on the
seawall or similar. It was 14% of the mapped routes that went below 50m from MHWM, and these
included a range of activities, for example bait diggers, dog walkers, joggers, cyclists and people out
on a family outing.
The implications of the results for further modelling and in relation to the disturbance of birds on
the European Sites are discussed
The Solent Disturbance & Mitigation Project. Phase II – results of the Solent household survey
This report sets out the results of the postal household survey component of the Solent Disturbance and Mitigation project. The work was commissioned by the Solent Forum in response to concerns over the impact of recreational pressure on features of the Solent SPA, SAC and Ramsar Sites. Of particular concern are the cumulative impacts of recreational use arising from potential new housing developments in Chichester District and South Hampshire.
The household survey was distributed to 5000 households within 25km of the coastline between Hurst Castle, including the north shoreline of the Isle of Wight. The questionnaires and reminders were sent between October and December 2010. The household survey contained three sections which elicited information relating to general and specific visits to the coast and household demographics.
A total of 1382 completed questionnaires were returned and 42% of these households had visited the coast the week prior to completing the survey. Only 4% of households (56) stated they never visited the coast. Households which did not visit the coast contained a lower number of people, lower number of dogs and a higher percentage did not have regular access to a private vehicle when compared to households that made regular coastal visits.
Of the households which visited the coast, 50% visited at least once a week. A total of 55% of households visited the coast equally all year and an additional 39% of households made more visits in the summer. There was a significant difference in coastal visit frequency between households which owned a least one dog and non dog owning households, with dog owning households making more visits. There was no significant difference in visit frequency between households who had garden access or whether the household dwelling type was a flat or ‘non- flat’.
The 1155 households providing full responses to the survey made an estimated annual total of 153,433 visits to the Solent coastline. The project and this survey divided the coastline into 103 numbered sections. Households made on average 133 annual coastal visits to 3.7 different sections of the coastline. On average each section received a total of 1490 annual visits but the number of coastal visits made to different sections was significantly different.
The most frequently given activities undertaken during a coastal visit were walking (20% of all activity responses) and enjoying the scenery (20%), followed by being on the beach (11%) and meeting up with friends (11% of all activity responses).
Households indicated where they undertook their activity during the coastal visit and for 47% of the visit responses the activity (walking, cycling, enjoying the scenery etc) was undertaken on the sea wall or the river bank. A further 39% of responses by households indicated they venture onto the beach/mudflat and 15% of responses actually took to the water.
The majority (52%) of coastal visits by households were made by car with 39% made by foot, 4% by bicycle and 5% by public transport. Of the households which made visits by car, 50% travelled 9.5km or less by road to the section they visited and 90% travelled 29.0km or less to their visited section by road. Of the households who visited specific sections by foot half lived within 1.0km of the section (straight line distance from postcode to nearest point on section) and 90% lived within 4.0km of the visited section.
Features that act as a deterrent for some households when selecting a coastal location to visit may also attract other households. For example, a requirement for dogs to be on leads and the presence of dog restrictions is rated as attractive to non dog owning households but as a deterrent by dog owning households. By far the most popular attractive feature when households choose which coastal location to visit was ‘sea views and attractive scenery’ followed by ‘feel safe’, ‘ability to do a range of different walks/routes ‘and the ‘presence of wildlife’.
Predictions were derived by fitting formal statistical models to the observed (household survey) data.
Specifically these models used observed visitor numbers per section per distance band and analysed these in relation to factors representing distance to section and section characteristics. Different models are presented within the report and separate models were generated for car and foot visitors, with each model showing a declining visitor rate with distance from the section – i.e. the further away people live the fewer visits they make. These models suggest some 52 million visits are made each year, by households within a 30km radius of the coastline between Hurst Castle to Chichester Harbour, including the north shore of the Isle of Wight. The models identify Portsmouth’s seafront (South Parade Pier to Fort Cumberland) as the most heavily visited coastal section, with over 3 million household visits per annum.
These predictive visit models will be used alongside the bird models, commissioned separately and subject to a further report, to assess the impacts of disturbance to wintering birds under different housing scenarios. The use of the visitor models and how they will link to the bird models within the next stages of the Solent Disturbance and Mitigation Project are discussed
MgB2 tunnel junctions and 19 K low-noise dc superconducting quantum interference devices
Point contact junctions made from two pieces of MgB2 can be adjusted to
exhibit either superconductor-insulator-superconductor (SIS) or
superconductor-normal metal-superconductor (SNS) current-voltage
characteristics. The SIS characteristics are in good agreement with the
standard tunneling model for s-wave superconductors, and yield an energy gap of
(2.02 +/- 0.08) meV. The SNS characteristics are in good agreement with the
predictions of the resistively-shunted junction model. DC Superconducting
QUantum Interference Devices made from two SNS junctions yield magnetic field
noise as low as 35 fT/Hz^{1/2} at 19 K.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure
Interchain coherence of coupled Luttinger liquids at all orders in perturbation theory
We analyze the problem of Luttinger liquids coupled via a single-particle
hopping \tp and introduce a systematic diagrammatic expansion in powers of
\tp. An analysis of the scaling of the diagrams at each order allows us to
determine the power-law behavior versus \tp of the interchain hopping and of
the Fermi surface warp. In particular, for strong interactions, we find that
the exponents are dominated by higher-order diagrams producing an enhanced
coherence and a failure of linear-response theory. Our results are valid at any
finite order in \tp for the self-energy.Comment: 4 pages, 3 ps figures. Accepted for publication in Phys. Rev. Let
Heralded state preparation in a superconducting qubit
We demonstrate high-fidelity, quantum nondemolition, single-shot readout of a
superconducting flux qubit in which the pointer state distributions can be
resolved to below one part in 1000. In the weak excitation regime, continuous
measurement permits the use of heralding to ensure initialization to a fiducial
state, such as the ground state. This procedure boosts readout fidelity to
93.9% by suppressing errors due to spurious thermal population. Furthermore,
heralding potentially enables a simple, fast qubit reset protocol without
changing the system parameters to induce Purcell relaxation.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figure
Wrinkling of a bilayer membrane
The buckling of elastic bodies is a common phenomenon in the mechanics of
solids. Wrinkling of membranes can often be interpreted as buckling under
constraints that prohibit large amplitude deformation. We present a combination
of analytic calculations, experiments, and simulations to understand wrinkling
patterns generated in a bilayer membrane. The model membrane is composed of a
flexible spherical shell that is under tension and that is circumscribed by a
stiff, essentially incompressible strip with bending modulus B. When the
tension is reduced sufficiently to a value \sigma, the strip forms wrinkles
with a uniform wavelength found theoretically and experimentally to be \lambda
= 2\pi(B/\sigma)^{1/3}. Defects in this pattern appear for rapid changes in
tension. Comparison between experiment and simulation further shows that, with
larger reduction of tension, a second generation of wrinkles with longer
wavelength appears only when B is sufficiently small.Comment: 9 pages, 5 color figure
The role of proton precipitation in Jovian aurora: Theory and observation
It was proposed that the Jovian auroral emissions observed by Voyager spacecraft could be explained by energetic protons precipitating into the upper atmosphere of Jupiter. Such precipitation of energetic protons results in Doppler-shifted Lyman alpha emission that can be quantitatively analyzed to determine the energy flux and energy distribution of the incoming particle beam. Modeling of the expected emission from a reasonably chosen Voyager energetic proton spectrum can be used in conjunction with International Ultraviolet Explorer (IUE) observations, which show a relative lack of red-shifted Lyman alpha emission, to set upper limits on the amount of proton precipitation taking place in the Jovian aurora. Such calculations indicate that less than 10 percent of the ultraviolet auroral emissions at Jupiter can be explained by proton precipitation
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