Reducing Car Dependence Has Economic, Environmental, and Social Benefits

Californians live in a car-dominant society. Decades of transportation and land use planning practices have created communities in which driving is a virtual necessity to access most destinations. Personal vehicles provide mobility benefits, but they also have many negative financial, public health, environmental, and social impacts. Technological innovations such as vehicle electrification can lessen some, but not all, of these impacts. A more comprehensive approach is to shape communities in a manner that gives people viable options other than a personal vehicle—such as walking, bicycling, or transit—to get where they need to go.Researchers at UC Davis reviewed published studies to summarize the range of household- and community-level benefits that can be realized by reducing car dependence in California. This policy brief summarizes the findings of that work.View the NCST Project Webpag

Behavior Coordination Methods on Autonomous Navigation of Physical Robot

Behavior based architecture gives robot fast and reliable action. If there are many behaviors in robot, behavior coordination is needed. Subsumption architecture and motor schema is example of behavior coordination methods. In order to study those methods characteristics, computer simulation is not enough, experiments in physical robot are needed to be done. It can be concluded from experiment result that the first method gives quick, robust but non smooth response. Meanwhile the latter gives smooth but slower response, and it is tend to reach target faster than the first one. Some limitation of physical robot experiment also presented here

Q Learning Behavior on Autonomous Navigation of Physical Robot

Behavior based architecture gives robot fast and reliable action. If there are many behaviors in robot, behavior coordination is needed. Subsumption architecture is behavior coordination method that give quick and robust response. Learning mechanism improve robot’s performance in handling uncertainty. Q learning is popular reinforcement learning method that has been used in robot learning because it is simple, convergent and off policy. In this paper, Q learning will be used as learning mechanism for obstacle avoidance behavior in autonomous robot navigation. Learning rate of Q learning affect robot’s performance in learning phase. As the result, Q learning algorithm is successfully implemented in a physical robot with its imperfect environment

Where do I belong? Volunteer attachment in a complex organization

To understand volunteer retention and recruitment in complex organizations, this paper focuses on volunteers' attachment to a multipurpose and multi-branch organization. Using the Red Cross in Flanders (Belgium), a service organization with multiple locations offering a variety of programs, we investigate whether volunteers' attachment is primarily directed toward the organization as a whole, or whether volunteers are more prone to develop localized attachment to the program or branch in which they participate. Our findings suggest that managers recruiting volunteers to large complex organizations should be cautious in using the overarching organizational mission to attract volunteers. Rather, attention should be put on specific programs and activities using volunteers. It is only through longer-term service that volunteers appreciate the organization's mission and principles and find their allegiance to the organization as a whole

MULTINATIONAL FOOD MARKETING: COMPETITIVE STRATEGIES OF U.S. FIRMS

International Relations/Trade, Marketing,

Generating Converging Bounds to the (Complex) Discrete States of the P2+iX3+iαXP^2 + iX^3 + i\alpha X Hamiltonian

The Eigenvalue Moment Method (EMM), Handy (2001), Handy and Wang (2001)) is applied to the $H_\alpha \equiv P^2 + iX^3 + i\alpha X$ Hamiltonian, enabling the algebraic/numerical generation of converging bounds to the complex energies of the $L^2$ states, as argued (through asymptotic methods) by Delabaere and Trinh (J. Phys. A: Math. Gen. {\bf 33} 8771 (2000)).Comment: Submitted to J. Phys.

The Road Less Traveled: Funders' Advice on the Path to Nonprofit Sustainability

(With apologies to Robert Frost, The Road Not Taken, 1920.) As part of the Capital Ideas symposium co-hosted by the Hauser Center for Nonprofit Organizations at Harvard University and the Nonprofit Finance Fund in March, 2007, an online survey was conducted about funder practices that support nonprofit sustainability. This article highlights the survey findings and the advice that funders offered from their own experiences as paths to greater nonprofit strength. Rather than a qualitative analysis of funding initiatives, this article presents guidance to the field from the field, as funders grappling with how best to strengthen the long term health of their grantees reflect on their works in progress. This article then goes a step further by annotating these lessons learned with the additional perspective offered from just four of the ten draft funding principles that have evolved from the Capital Ideas symposium with the hope of encouraging more funders to consider these principles and practices in their own work. The Capital Ideas survey generated 48 profiles of funding approaches, practices and strategies that support nonprofit organizational capacity building, long term financial health and or programmatic improvement. The lessons funders learned from those initiatives informed ten funding principles that were introduced at the Capital Ideas symposium on March 15, 2007 at Harvard University. Four of those draft principles, outlined below, offered concepts that resonated throughout the profiles and are offered as key steps for funders to consider as they reflect upon their own giving practices. These principles include: Understand when youre building or buying, and fund accordingly. Actively pool resources when more funds are required to achieve results. Minimize the transaction costs for grantees and funders of applying for and reporting on grants. Fund at the organizational rather than the programmatic level, even when your primary interest is in one program. This publication is Hauser Center Working Paper No. 40. The Hauser Center Working Paper Series was launched during the summer of 2000. The Series enables the Hauser Center to share with a broad audience important works-in-progress written by Hauser Center scholars and researchers

What California Gains from Reducing Car Dependence

Cars provide an unparalleled level of mobility but have negative financial, public health, environmental, and social impacts. Reducing the need for driving in California would produce a range of household- and community-level benefits. Driving is associated with adverse health effects (e.g., obesity, high blood pressure, depression, injuries, fatalities), while commuting by walking or biking provides numerous physical and mental health benefits. A reduction in driving would also improve public health by decreasing air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions. It would save substantial sums of money:  households spend about $9,000/year or 16$500 million per year on highway maintenance. A less car-dependent society would also be more equitable for those with limited income or limited physical abilities who cannot drive, to the benefit not just of those individuals but the community as a whole. While it is not realistic in the foreseeable future for most Californians to live without their cars, it is possible to decrease car dependence. Doing so requires a shift away from a century-old prioritization of the goal of reducing vehicle delays over other important goals. Creating a less car-dependent world is not necessarily more costly to the public and can be achieved over time through changes in land use and transportation planning practices. Answers to many of the frequently asked questions about such efforts are provided.View the NCST Project Webpag