Analys av den europeiska nattågstrafikens tillbakagång och framtidsutsikter - Historik, nedläggningsorsaker, framgångsfaktorer och lärdomar

This thesis concerns the last decade’s considerable decline in western European night train traffic. First, the context of the study is presented with a brief overview of climate challenges, liberalization of the railway market within the European Union and theoretical aspects of demand for night train traffic. A historical overview of night train traffic in general is made, whereafter several factors believed to be contributing to the decline are presented and evaluated. Some of the most important contributing factors are high operating costs, competition from high-speed trains and low-cost airlines, disadvantageous policies and regulations as well as old rolling stock. The decision of the Austrian railways to take over some of the German night train services is analyzed in particular. Thereafter the present role and niches of night trains are studied, and an outlook is made, examining the development of Very Long-Distance Night Trains using high-speed rolling stock. Possible success factors are evaluated and presented in a synthesis, of which the most important are integrated booking service, higher comfort, using modern multiple units and/or high-speed night trains and lower price. Some of the most important recommendations and lessons learned collected from interviewees and literature are to harmonize VAT regulations and climate fees between the different modes of transport, categorize night trains as a special traffic segment and enable the EU to create a night-wagon pool from which the operators could rent vehicles

Regionala gummihjulståg - En studie av möjligheten att införa högkvalitativ kollektivtrafik i mindre starka stråktill lägre kostnad än för järnväg

This report investigates the possibility of implementing a high-quality, regional, rubber-wheled based public transport system with train-like features to a lower cost than that of a traditional raliway. In order to be regarded as fulfilling this goal, the system, hereafter called rubber-wheel trains, must both be similar enough to railways to be regarded as trains by the passengers – and also be considerably cheaper than the conventional railway. In order to achieve these goals, the following main criteria are used: speed, comfort, security/reliability, long term stability and image/status. The maximum velocity is, initially, proposed to be 140 km/h (87 mph), comfort levels will be equivalent as those of a smaller regional train, onboard security is guaranteed by train staff, while reliability is enhanced by the fact that the rubber-wheel trains cannot leave the track. Long term stability will be almost as high as that of a railway due to the dedicated track. Also the image/status of the system will be considerably higher than that of bus-based public transport. However, it will most probably not reach all the way to the image/status of traditional railways. The system is based upon approx. 40-45 m long train looking vehicles on a separate track (guided busway). Automatic steering is used through steering wheels running towards kerbs/curbs in the same manner as that of the O-Bahn system. Inside the vehicles, space and service is equivalent to that in regional/local trains. The rubber wheeled trains are elecrically powered with a double catenary and are to run on completely dedicated tracks, preferably on old railway banks. They are to have large curve radii and superelevated curves. The stops are to be designed as small railway stations, usually one per village or town. Larger towns could, however, have more than one stop. The system is also proposed to have a simple signalling system in order to prevent collision while driving on single track. In Sweden, the system will most likely be regarded as a kind of tramway, and will follow the laws concerning trams and subways. The report draws the conclusion that the rubber wheel train system will cost about half of what an equivalent conventional railway would. By guiding the rubber wheel trains to the same platform as conventional trains (by straddling the track) swift connections to railway trains can be ensured. Thereby passengers can benefit from the short travelling times of railways. The system considerably shortens travelling times between towns and villages along the track/busway. It can also compete with car travel; with about the same travelling times, in some cases it’s even faster than travelling by car. Compared to a railway, the decrease in travelling time will be smaller, about half. Hence it is hard to give a general statement concerning which system would be most beneficial with regards to a Cost Benefit Analysis. However, in a case in which both conventional rail and rubber-wheel trains would be considered non-economical, the rubber wheel train system would demand less government subsidies through taxes, and therefore speaking for the implemention of rubber wheel trains in such a case. At the same time the system demands relatively high passenger numbers to be motivated. The conclusion therefore is that, even if the system meets the demands of railway-likedness and lower cost than that of a railway, it isn’t sure that it automatically will be more beneficial to society. It’s possible to reach very far in the pursuit of emulating the benefits of railway; however this also increases the cost. Hence, there are no easy ”shortcuts” to the ”railway magic” without paying the price for it. In the case of rubber wheel trains, this is however still half of the cost of a railway, which also means that it gives you much ”railway” in comparison to the investment. Keywords: ? Accesablity ? BRT ? Comfort ? Image ? Infrastructure ? Kerb guidance ? O-Bahn ? Public transport ? Railway ? Regional traffic ? Rubber wheel train ? Structurizing effects ? Superbusses ? Tramway ? Trolley buse

Sampling Distributions of Optimal Portfolio Weights and Characteristics in Low and Large Dimensions

Optimal portfolio selection problems are determined by the (unknown) parameters of the data generating process. If an investor want to realise the position suggested by the optimal portfolios he/she needs to estimate the unknown parameters and to account the parameter uncertainty into the decision process. Most often, the parameters of interest are the population mean vector and the population covariance matrix of the asset return distribution. In this paper we characterise the exact sampling distribution of the estimated optimal portfolio weights and their characteristics by deriving their sampling distribution which is present in terms of a stochastic representation. This approach possesses several advantages, like (i) it determines the sampling distribution of the estimated optimal portfolio weights by expressions which could be used to draw samples from this distribution efficiently; (ii) the application of the derived stochastic representation provides an easy way to obtain the asymptotic approximation of the sampling distribution. The later property is used to show that the high-dimensional asymptotic distribution of optimal portfolio weights is a multivariate normal and to determine its parameters. Moreover, a consistent estimator of optimal portfolio weights and their characteristics is derived under the high-dimensional settings. Via an extensive simulation study, we investigate the finite-sample performance of the derived asymptotic approximation and study its robustness to the violation of the model assumptions used in the derivation of the theoretical results.Comment: 39 pages, 4 figures (this version: small typo in the titel corrected

Sleep in relation to psychiatric symptoms and perceived stress in Swedish adolescents aged 15 to 19 years

Background:Sleep affects psychiatric health and perceived stress during adolescence.Objective:The first aim of this study was to investigate the prevalence of poor sleep in a sample of Swedish adolescents aged 15 to 19 years. The second aim was to investigate correlations between: a) sleep and psychiatric symptoms and; b) sleep and perceived stress. The third aim was to examine possible sex differences in sleep.Method:In 2011, a total of 185 Swedish adolescents (aged 15 to 19 years) from two upper secondary schools participated in this cross-sectional study. We used three different psychometric scales: Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI), Symptoms Checklist (SCL-90), and Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) to measure sleep, general psychiatric health and perceived stress.Results:In total, 76% of the female students and 71% of the male students had poor overall sleep quality. A large majority, 93%, reported daytime dysfunction and 60% reported problems staying awake during daily activities. The correlation between sleep and general psychiatric health was 0.44 and the correlation between sleep quality and perceived stress was 0.48. Female students reported significantly more sleep disturbances than male students do.Conclusions:Three out of four of the upper secondary school students presented with poor overall sleep that associated with psychiatric symptoms and perceived stress. These findings add to results from earlier studies and imply that interventions to improve sleep in adolescents, individually as well as on a societal level, should be considered as one way of trying to impact the observed rising numbers of psychiatric complaints. Such interventions may improve mental and somatic health in adolescents and prevent the development of psychiatric and stress-related symptoms. Further studies of possible methods, and their implementation, for improving sleep in adolescents should be of high priority

Digital nerve injuries: Epidemiology, results, costs, and impact on daily life.

Epidemiology, results of treatment, impact on activity of daily living (ADL), and costs for treatment of digital nerve injuries have not been considered consistently. Case notes of patients of 0-99 years of age living in Malmö municipality, Sweden, who presented with a digital nerve injury and were referred to the Department of Hand Surgery in 1995-2005 were analysed retrospectively. The incidence was 6.2/100 000 inhabitants and year. Most commonly men (75%; median age 29 years) were injured. Isolated nerve injuries and concomitant tendon injuries were equally common. The direct costs (hospital stay, operation, outpatient visits, visits to a nurse and/or a hand therapist) for a concomitant tendon injury was almost double compared with an isolated digital nerve injury (6136 EUR [range, 744-29 689 EUR] vs 2653 EUR [range, 468-6949 EUR]). More than 50% of the patients who worked were injured at work and 79% lost time from work (median 59 days [range 3-337]). Permanent nerve dysfunction for the individual patient with ADL problems and subjective complaints of fumbleness, cold sensitivity, and pain occur in the patients despite surgery. It is concluded that digital nerve injuries, often considered as a minor injury and that affect young people at productive age, cause costs, and disability. Focus should be directed against prevention of the injury and to improve nerve regeneration from different aspects

Läkemedel och hormoner i avloppsslam under lagring, kompostering och ammoniakbehandling

Syftet med detta projekt var att öka kunskapen om hur utformningen av hanteringskedjan för återföring av slam till mark påverkar hur mycket läkemedel och hormoner som förs till marken vid spridning, antingen direkt via slamgödsling på åkermark, eller indirekt via tillverkning av anläggningsjord innehållande slamkompost. Projektets huvudhypotes var att ju bättre oxidationsförhållandena i slammet är ju bättre blir reduktionen av antibiotika, övriga läkemedel och hormoner. I projektet studerades redutionen av 12 antibiotika, 30 övriga läkemedel och 3 hormoner i 6 försöksled med initialt olika andel luftfyllda porer, och därmed olika förutsättningar för oxidation. De sex försöksleden, i ordning från stor initial andel luftfyllda porer till liten, var: MesPKom, slamkompost med mesofilt rötat poröst slam och krossat trädgårdsavfall; MesPÖpp, mesofilt rötat poröst slam som lagrades i öppen sträng; TermÖpp, termofilt rötat slam som lagrades i öppen sträng; MesKTäck, mesofilt rötat kompakt slam som lagrades i sträng täckt med ensilageplast; MesKÖpp, mesofilt rötat kompakt slam som lagrades i öppen sträng; och MesKTäckAm, mesofilt rötat via ureatillsats ammoniakbehandlat slam som lagrades i sträng täckt med ensilageplast. Dessutom studerades reduktionen i fem skikt olika djupt under ytan i MesPÖpp. De luftfyllda porer som fanns i de studerade slammen vid start av försöket försvann inom ett halvt år utom i slamkomposten MesPKom och de övre 40 centimetrarna på slamsträngarna. Resten av slammet i de olika försöksleden var anaerobt. Huvudhypotesen visade sig stämma. Reduktionen av antibiotika, övriga läkemedel ochhormoner var överlägset bäst i ledet med bäst oxidationsförhållanden, kompostledet, och bra till mycket bra i de övre, aeroba, skikten i djupstudien. Skillnaderna i reduktion av antibiotika, övriga läkemedel och hormoner mellan övriga försöksled, alla huvudsakligen anaeroba, kunde ej förklaras i detta projekt, förutom reduktionen av det naturliga hormonet östradiol vars reduktion hämmades om slammet rötats termofilt eller ammoniakbehandlats genom tillsats av urea. Under försöksåret blev reduktionen av antibiotika stor (>90 %), liksom av hormoner (>75%) oavsett om behandlingen var aerob eller anaerob. Reduktionen av såväl antibiotika som hormoner var bäst i de aeroba behandlingarna. Reduktionen av övriga läkemedel var måttligt (>50 %) i de övre aeroba skiktet på slamsträngen och mycket stor (95 %) i den aeroba, varma, storskaliga slamkomposten. I de anaeroba behandlingarna var reduktionen av övriga läkemedel i genomsnitt låg eller obefintlig. Den varierade mellan -33 %, alltså en ökning med en tredjedel, och en minsking med 34 % under försöksåret. I ett kopplat projekt jämfördes reduktionen av PFAS, ftalater och organofosfatestrar mellan slam som lagrades i öppen sträng i ett år (MesPÖpp) och slam som komposterades med krossat trädgårdsavfall (MesPKom) i ett halvt år. Resultaten visade på betydligt lägre halter av PFAS, ftalater och organofosfatestrar efter ett halvt års kompostering än efter ett års lagring i sträng

Speech and language therapy for aphasia following stroke

Background  Aphasia is an acquired language impairment following brain damage that affects some or all language modalities: expression and understanding of speech, reading, and writing. Approximately one third of people who have a stroke experience aphasia.  Objectives  To assess the effects of speech and language therapy (SLT) for aphasia following stroke.  Search methods  We searched the Cochrane Stroke Group Trials Register (last searched 9 September 2015), CENTRAL (2015, Issue 5) and other Cochrane Library Databases (CDSR, DARE, HTA, to 22 September 2015), MEDLINE (1946 to September 2015), EMBASE (1980 to September 2015), CINAHL (1982 to September 2015), AMED (1985 to September 2015), LLBA (1973 to September 2015), and SpeechBITE (2008 to September 2015). We also searched major trials registers for ongoing trials including ClinicalTrials.gov (to 21 September 2015), the Stroke Trials Registry (to 21 September 2015), Current Controlled Trials (to 22 September 2015), and WHO ICTRP (to 22 September 2015). In an effort to identify further published, unpublished, and ongoing trials we also handsearched theInternational Journal of Language and Communication Disorders(1969 to 2005) and reference lists of relevant articles, and we contacted academic institutions and other researchers. There were no language restrictions.  Selection criteria  Randomised controlled trials (RCTs) comparing SLT (a formal intervention that aims to improve language and communication abilities, activity and participation) versus no SLT; social support or stimulation (an intervention that provides social support and communication stimulation but does not include targeted therapeutic interventions); or another SLT intervention (differing in duration, intensity, frequency, intervention methodology or theoretical approach).  Data collection and analysis  We independently extracted the data and assessed the quality of included trials. We sought missing data from investigators.  Main results  We included 57 RCTs (74 randomised comparisons) involving 3002 participants in this review (some appearing in more than one comparison). Twenty-seven randomised comparisons (1620 participants) assessed SLT versus no SLT; SLT resulted in clinically and statistically significant benefits to patients' functional communication (standardised mean difference (SMD) 0.28, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.06 to 0.49, P = 0.01), reading, writing, and expressive language, but (based on smaller numbers) benefits were not evident at follow-up. Nine randomised comparisons (447 participants) assessed SLT with social support and stimulation; meta-analyses found no evidence of a difference in functional communication, but more participants withdrew from social support interventions than SLT. Thirty-eight randomised comparisons (1242 participants) assessed two approaches to SLT. Functional communication was significantly better in people with aphasia that received therapy at a high intensity, high dose, or over a long duration compared to those that received therapy at a lower intensity, lower dose, or over a shorter period of time. The benefits of a high intensity or a high dose of SLT were confounded by a significantly higher dropout rate in these intervention groups. Generally, trials randomised small numbers of participants across a range of characteristics (age, time since stroke, and severity profiles), interventions, and outcomes.  Authors' conclusions  Our review provides evidence of the effectiveness of SLT for people with aphasia following stroke in terms of improved functional communication, reading, writing, and expressive language compared with no therapy. There is some indication that therapy at high intensity, high dose or over a longer period may be beneficial. HIgh-intensity and high dose interventions may not be acceptable to all