Assessing the Fitness-For-Purpose of strategic transport research in support of European transport policy

The transport policy environment is changing, because of increasing mobility of people and goods, world wide use of ICT, a rising importance of the knowledge economy, etc. Future methods for transport policy assessments will have to integrate these emerging trends, but above all, the new research knowledge produced needs to be taken better into use within the policy processes. To tackle the problem, the paper presents a generic fitness-for-purpose (FFP) Assessment method for research projects in support of transport policy. Based on the results of a case study, the paper argues that by linking a systematic FFP Analysis of transport research projects with researcher-civil servant network building, a method for accepting, elaborating and applying the produced European transport research knowledge can be provided. By doing this, the paper contributes to a more systematic and integrative assessment of transport research in policy support, and hopefully enhances the integration of transport research and policy making while at the same time, initiating a better based policy process. We see that FFP Assessments could offer an essential element for the policy relevant transport research knowledge production in the future

Challenges and needs of European cities in using geofencing for urban traffic management

This report presents the results and analysis of exploratory interviews and a questionnaire survey among transport experts and professionals in Europe dealing with geofencing in urban transport management. As part of the European collaboration project GeoSence - "Geofencing strategies for implementation in urban traffic management and planning", the report contributes to a first step of solving the problems by identifying and exploring the challenges and needs of transport authorities. Starting from the cities' biggest traffic challenges, as experienced by municipalities and cities, but also from the perspective of regional and national authorities, the report focuses mainly on geofencing and its following unresolved implementation issues, such as lack of regulation, an issue prevalent across both experienced and less experienced users of geofencing, GNSS accuracy and infrastructure, user acceptance, costs, knowledge and various practicalities. In the discussion section we synthesise how to overcome some of the barriers and how to tackle those needs suggested by the informants, as well as presenting risks and possible mitigation options, and a transferability analysis for cities that do not use geofencing yet. While findings show the applications of geofencing for micro-mobility and parking as the most transferable use case, the case also is an example of how regulation and the legal framework would need to keep pace with the development of the practical solutions. In conclusion, several recommendations are derived, including the need for investing in digital infrastructure in European cities, and further developments matching digital and physical infrastructure to achieve the potential for geofencing. Further, increasing municipalities capacity for knowledge building- and sharing, starting new geofencing real traffic trials, as well as scaling up and transferring existing and good functioning solutions will be key.publishedVersio

SUGAR. Sustainable Urban Goods Logistics Achieved by Regional and Local Policies. City Logistics Best Practices: a Handbook for Authorities

This publication is one of the main results of the SUGAR project and it is focused on the Best Practices analysis, a tool for the involvement of the community of experts in the emerging field of city logistics. The handbook proposes a quick overview on the project, a detailed collection of best practice synthesis, a synthesis of transferrability issues of such practices and the methodology for applying some of them to different cities and fields

Multi-criteria evaluation method for freight logistics innovations

The objective of this study is to build up a common approach for the assessment of logistics innovations. Innovations are referred to here as best practices and are considered as existing approaches or solutions providing an answer to a relevant problem or challenge in freight transport. The impact evaluation of logistics innovations takes into account strategic targets, topics covered, transferability and novelty of the best practices. A freight specific multi-criteria analysis approach was designed for the evaluation process

Observing the Evolution of the Universe

How did the universe evolve? The fine angular scale (l>1000) temperature and polarization anisotropies in the CMB are a Rosetta stone for understanding the evolution of the universe. Through detailed measurements one may address everything from the physics of the birth of the universe to the history of star formation and the process by which galaxies formed. One may in addition track the evolution of the dark energy and discover the net neutrino mass. We are at the dawn of a new era in which hundreds of square degrees of sky can be mapped with arcminute resolution and sensitivities measured in microKelvin. Acquiring these data requires the use of special purpose telescopes such as the Atacama Cosmology Telescope (ACT), located in Chile, and the South Pole Telescope (SPT). These new telescopes are outfitted with a new generation of custom mm-wave kilo-pixel arrays. Additional instruments are in the planning stages.Comment: Science White Paper submitted to the US Astro2010 Decadal Survey. Full list of 177 author available at http://cmbpol.uchicago.ed

Global, regional, and national burden of stroke and its risk factors, 1990–2019: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2019

Background Regularly updated data on stroke and its pathological types, including data on their incidence, prevalence, mortality, disability, risk factors, and epidemiological trends, are important for evidence-based stroke care planning and resource allocation. The Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study (GBD) aims to provide a standardised and comprehensive measurement of these metrics at global, regional, and national levels. Methods We applied GBD 2019 analytical tools to calculate stroke incidence, prevalence, mortality, disability-adjusted life-years (DALYs), and the population attributable fraction (PAF) of DALYs (with corresponding 95% uncertainty intervals [UIs]) associated with 19 risk factors, for 204 countries and territories from 1990 to 2019. These estimates were provided for ischaemic stroke, intracerebral haemorrhage, subarachnoid haemorrhage, and all strokes combined, and stratified by sex, age group, and World Bank country income level. Findings In 2019, there were 12·2 million (95% UI 11·0–13·6) incident cases of stroke, 101 million (93·2–111) prevalent cases of stroke, 143 million (133–153) DALYs due to stroke, and 6·55 million (6·00–7·02) deaths from stroke. Globally, stroke remained the second-leading cause of death (11·6% [10·8–12·2] of total deaths) and the third-leading cause of death and disability combined (5·7% [5·1–6·2] of total DALYs) in 2019. From 1990 to 2019, the absolute number of incident strokes increased by 70·0% (67·0–73·0), prevalent strokes increased by 85·0% (83·0–88·0), deaths from stroke increased by 43·0% (31·0–55·0), and DALYs due to stroke increased by 32·0% (22·0–42·0). During the same period, age-standardised rates of stroke incidence decreased by 17·0% (15·0–18·0), mortality decreased by 36·0% (31·0–42·0), prevalence decreased by 6·0% (5·0–7·0), and DALYs decreased by 36·0% (31·0–42·0). However, among people younger than 70 years, prevalence rates increased by 22·0% (21·0–24·0) and incidence rates increased by 15·0% (12·0–18·0). In 2019, the age-standardised stroke-related mortality rate was 3·6 (3·5–3·8) times higher in the World Bank low-income group than in the World Bank high-income group, and the age-standardised stroke-related DALY rate was 3·7 (3·5–3·9) times higher in the low-income group than the high-income group. Ischaemic stroke constituted 62·4% of all incident strokes in 2019 (7·63 million [6·57–8·96]), while intracerebral haemorrhage constituted 27·9% (3·41 million [2·97–3·91]) and subarachnoid haemorrhage constituted 9·7% (1·18 million [1·01–1·39]). In 2019, the five leading risk factors for stroke were high systolic blood pressure (contributing to 79·6 million [67·7–90·8] DALYs or 55·5% [48·2–62·0] of total stroke DALYs), high body-mass index (34·9 million [22·3–48·6] DALYs or 24·3% [15·7–33·2]), high fasting plasma glucose (28·9 million [19·8–41·5] DALYs or 20·2% [13·8–29·1]), ambient particulate matter pollution (28·7 million [23·4–33·4] DALYs or 20·1% [16·6–23·0]), and smoking (25·3 million [22·6–28·2] DALYs or 17·6% [16·4–19·0]). Interpretation The annual number of strokes and deaths due to stroke increased substantially from 1990 to 2019, despite substantial reductions in age-standardised rates, particularly among people older than 70 years. The highest age-standardised stroke-related mortality and DALY rates were in the World Bank low-income group. The fastest-growing risk factor for stroke between 1990 and 2019 was high body-mass index. Without urgent implementation of effective primary prevention strategies, the stroke burden will probably continue to grow across the world, particularly in low-income countries.publishedVersio