Discontinuous Regions: High-Speed Rail and the Limits of Traditional Governance

Globalization and the interconnectivity of the economy have magnified the role of regions, restructuring social and economic relationships into networks that span increasing distances. At the same time, greater attention is due to localized urban quality, as non-vehicular modes and compact forms of development become critical in an environmentally conscious world. Within this context, increasing interest and adoption of high-speed rail (HSR)—a mode that addresses multiple scales—is unsurprising. HSR technology is used both to respond to existing trends of increased interconnectivity between urban centers and to enhance economic connections within regions and mega-regions. HSR has the unique ability to enable long-distance commuting across discontinuous regions that are far enough apart so as not to be adequately integrated by auto travel. This new geography of daily experiences has important potential implications for governance and relations among cities. Using Portugal as a case study, this paper examines the relationship between HSR development and new models of spatial organization and governance. Based on interviews with national and local officials, we discuss ways in which HSR planning is changing attitudes towards regional identity and urban governance, including: the integration of national entities into local planning processes, the potential for new models of commuting, and the role of HSR as an exogenous catalyst for regional cooperation. The case study reveals how HSR can serve as a catalyst for governments to rethink regional identity, intergovernmental relationships, and competitive positioning. The prospect of HSR implementation raises the profile of potential intraregional complementarity and highlights the importance of inter-governmental relationships

Uncertainty and Inter-jurisdictional High-speed Rail Planning: Insights from Portugal and the United Kingdom

Within public policy and academic discourses, high-speed rail (HSR) is presented as a way of achieving “smarter” or more sustainable forms of growth. Realizing this promise requires coordinated policy efforts across levels of government and at different moments along a project’s timeline. The research presented here makes use of a systems perspective to study the barriers to- and opportunities of inter-jurisdictional HSR planning. The paper draws on interview material with officials involved in the Portuguese and United Kingdom HSR planning processes. Uncertainty is found to be of significant relevance to the manner in which national and local or regional governments interact. Those interactions in turn affect the realized physical reality of the HSR network and its integration into existing land use and transport systems. The paper examines two sources of uncertainty—uncertainty of outcomes and the uncertainty of a multi-actor inter-jurisdictional system of control. Case studies are used to explore how existing processes and evaluations mechanisms affect the level to which local knowledge and initiatives are incorporated into iterative HSR system design. The research additionally reveals how initial conditions can be important determinants of HSR success by shaping a system’s ability to adapt to realizations of currently uncertain futures. The paper concludes by offering two approaches to building a HSR implementation process that successfully incorporates HSR-supportive local and regional policies. The approaches combine formal inter-jurisdictional planning commitments with informal coalition building, to together enhance HSR’s ability to achieve its full potential

Intermediate cities, inter-jurisdictional planning, and the implications for high-speed rail in Portugal

Thesis (M.C.P. in Transportation)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Urban Studies and Planning, 2013.This electronic version was submitted by the student author. The certified thesis is available in the Institute Archives and Special Collections.Cataloged from student-submitted PDF version of thesis.Includes bibliographical references.Globalization has magnified the role of regions, restructuring social and economic relationships into networks that span increasing distances. At the same time, greater attention is paid to urban quality, as non-vehicular modes and compact forms of development become critical in an environmentally conscious world. Within this context, increasing interest and adoption of high-speed rail (HSR)-- mode with spatial sustainability objectives--is unsurprising. HSR has the potential to integrate cities into mutually supportive networks across long distances while also supporting more sustainable forms of development. For HSR to become a sustainable investment, however, requires coordinated policy efforts across levels of government and at different points in a project's life-cycle. This investigation spans multiple scales of the physical environment and institutional sphere, examines ways of coupling institutional change with technological change, and addresses the importance of uncertainty as a driver of system behavior. We focus on inter-jurisdictional relationships, with special attention paid to smaller intermediate cities brought within one-hour's travel time of a larger metropolis by HSR services. Mid-distance service (<250 km) has strong spatial implications and can expand connections to the scale of new discontinuous regions--single labor and commercial markets that spans long distances but do not include all intermediate areas. Both Portugal and the United Kingdom (UK) are planning HSR systems that will provide mid-distance service. Through stakeholder interviews and a critical reading of the literature, this thesis develops a theory-based assessment of goals for regional restructuring, studies existing and planned Portuguese rail-commuter-cities, and compares HSR planning in Portugal and the UK. We see evidence that HSR can induce new ways of thinking about urbanization, regional connectivity, and governance. The scope of change that might be put into effect by HSR creates greater incentives for collaboration than those that normally exist. We find that local knowledge and policy will improve HSR design and implementation by helping to ensure smooth interfaces between HSR and existing urban mobility systems. Developing decision-making structures that will work across geographic scales and sectors of government, and long-term uncertainty, will be critical in helping HSR achieve 3E--Economic, Environmental and Equitable--sustainability.by Naomi E. G. Stein.M.C.P.in Transportatio

Integrating engineering systems research and undergraduate education through a term-length case study

Introduction The MIT-Portugal Program (MPP) was launched in 2007 with the dual objectives of conducting innovative research and establishing leading academic degree programs through international collaboration across a range of technical disciplines. Among the first attempts to integrate the research and teaching objectives of the MPP was the Spring 2009 offering of Engineering System Design, a required course for third- and fourth-year undergraduates in MIT’s Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering. The course employed a semester-long case study, drawing heavily on active MPP transportation and engineering systems research for teaching and assignment content

Megacities and High Speed Rail systems: which comes first?

A megacity is usually defined as a metropolitan area with a total population in excess of 10 million people. The number of megacities is increasing worldwide. In most agglomerations and megacities, urban planning and public infrastructure can guide the urban development in order to achieve a proper sustainable structure only partially. The extension of cities is in most cases in advance of urban development work and the provision of public facilities (Kotter, 2004). In Europe, apart from London and Paris, megacities are rarer. However, due to the general high density of population in Europe and the short distance between medium and large cities there is the possibility of High Speed Rail (HSR) enables the emergence of groups of cities that will be linked together and thus reap the economic benefits associated with megacities, namely economies of scale, economies of agglomeration and bigger labour markets. In this contribution the authors argue that in some cases, specific facilities can foster the formation of megacities; in fact, this is the case of HSR systems. Specifically, High-Speed trains can be used to solve two different accessibility problems. In the first case, where a point-to-point link is dominant, each train is a potential substitute for an air connection between two cities, i.e. it connects cities (or rather CBDs) at long distance with a direct train connection (Blum et al., 1997).The HSR links between Paris and Lyon, Paris and London and, Tokyo and Osaka, could be seen as examples of this first type of train connection. In the second case, where a HSR network is dominant, the rail system links together many cities and CBDs and, hence, creates a new type of region with a high intra-regional accessibility sharing a common labour market and a common market for household and business services. In this case the HSR binds together cities in a band, where each pair of cities is at a time distance of between 20 minutes and 1 hour, allowing daily commuting. In the U.S., HSR projects are very recent and they will have the role of connecting already formed megacities. An example is the state of California, which is planning an 800-mile HSR service connecting Los Angeles and San Francisco into a two and a half hour trip. On the other hand, Europe, together with Asia, is the leader in HSR systems; in fact the development of HSR has been one of the central features of recent European Union transport infrastructure policy. The proposals for a European HSR network emerged in a report of the 1990 Community of European Railways and this was essentially adopted as the base for what became the European Community’s proposed Trans-European Network for HSR (Vickerman, 1997). In this paper the case studies of Portugal, where the HSR is a work in progress and of Italy, in which some lines have already been built, will be described in detail from the viewpoint of the various kinds of development described above

Obsessive-Compulsive (Anankastic) Personality Disorder in the ICD-11: A Scoping Review

© 2021 Gecaite-Stonciene, Lochner, Marincowitz, Fineberg and Stein. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Introduction: With the shift from a categorical to a dimensional model, ICD-11 has made substantial changes to the diagnosis of personality disorders (PDs), including obsessive-compulsive (anankastic) personality disorder (OCPD). The ICD-11 PD model proposes a single diagnosis of PD with specifications regarding severity and domains. However, a systematic overview of ICD-11 anankastia is lacking. In this review we address the reformulation of the OCPD diagnosis in the ICD-11, and draw comparisons with the DSM-5, with a particular focus on diagnostic validity and clinical utility. We hypothesized that the ICD-11 PD model is a diagnostically valid and clinically useful framework to assess those with OCPD, with specific emphasis on the anankastia domain as the primary trait qualifier. Methods: Literature published from 2010 to 2020 was systematically searched using the PubMed/MEDLINE, PsychInfo, Cochrane, and Web of Sciences search engines, in order to find all articles that addressed ICD-11 anankastia. Relevant articles were collated, and themes of these articles subsequently extracted. To check for methodological quality, the NICE checklist was used. Results: Out of the 264 publications identified, 19 articles were included in this review. Four themes were identified, namely (a) overlap of DSM-5 OCPD with the ICD-11 PD model, (b) the factorial structure of the ICD-11 PD model with respect to the anankastia domain, (c) the clinical utility of the ICD-11 PD model, and (d) comparison of the ICD-11 PD model of anankastia with the DSM-5 alternative model for OCPD. Conclusions: The ICD-11 anankastia domain overlaps with DSM-5 OCPD traits, and the factor analyses of the ICD-11 PD model further support the diagnostic validity of this domain. There is some limited support for the clinical utility of the ICD-11 PD model of anankastia but further studies are needed, including of its relationship to obsessive-compulsive and related disorders.Peer reviewe

Do children with recurrent abdominal pain grow up to become adolescents who control their weight by fasting?:Results from a UK population-based cohort

Objective Gastrointestinal (GI) problems are common in eating disorders, but it is unclear whether these problems predate the onset of disordered eating. Recurrent abdominal pain (RAP) is the most prevalent GI problem of childhood, and this study aimed to explore longitudinal associations between persistent RAP (at ages 7 and 9) and fasting for weight control at 16. Method The Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) is a UK population cohort of children. Childhood RAP was reported by mothers and defined as RAP 5+ (5 pain episodes in the past year) in our primary analysis, and RAP 3+ (3 pain episodes) in our sensitivity analysis. Fasting for weight control was reported by adolescents at 16. We used logistic regression models to examine associations, with adjustments for potential confounders. Results After adjustments, we found no association between childhood RAP 5+ and adolescent fasting for weight control at 16 (OR 1.30 (95% Confidence Intervals [CI] 0.87, 1.94) p = .197). However, we did find an association between RAP 3+ and later fasting, in the fully adjusted model (OR 1.50 [95% CI 1.16, 1.94] p = .002), and after excluding those with pre‐existing anxiety (OR 1.52 [95% CI 1.17, 1.97] p = .002). Discussion Our findings suggest a possible independent contribution of RAP to later risk of fasting for weight control, and RAP should be enquired about in the assessment of eating disorders. However, frequency of childhood abdominal pain (as captured by ALSPAC) may be less important to long‐term outcomes than functional impairment

Altered cognitive response to serotonin challenge as a candidate endophenotype for obsessive-compulsive disorder.

RATIONALE: Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) implicates dysfunction of orbitofrontal and insula-related circuitry and of the serotonin system. There is an on-going search in psychiatry for intermediate biological markers, termed 'endophenotypes', that exist not only in patients with a given disorder but also in their clinically unaffected first-degree relatives. OBJECTIVE: Pharmacological challenge is recognized as a means of eliciting an endophenotype, but this strategy has yet to be used in OCD. METHODS: Twenty-three OCD patients without comorbidities (12 [52.2 %] female), 13 clinically asymptomatic first-degree relatives of OCD patients (11 [84.6 %] female) and 27 healthy controls (16 [59.3 %] female) received single-dose escitalopram (20 mg) and placebo in a randomized double-blind crossover design. Effects of treatment on decision-making were quantified using the Cambridge Gamble Task (CGT) in conjunction with a mixed model analysis of covariance (ANCOVA). RESULTS: There was a significant interaction between serotonergic challenge and group for risk adjustment on the CGT (F = 4.1406; p = 0.02). Only controls showed a significant placebo-drug change in risk adjustment (p = 0.02; versus p > 0.10). Numerically, escitalopram was associated with increase in risk adjustment in controls and reductions in the other groups. Change in risk adjustment was similar in OCD patients and relatives (p = 0.806) and differed significantly from controls (p = 0.007; p = 0.041, respectively). CONCLUSIONS: Individuals with OCD, and first-degree relatives, showed an altered cognitive response to serotonin challenge. This is the first demonstration of a candidate pharmacological challenge endophenotype for the disorder. Future work should confirm these findings in a larger sample size and ideally extend them to other cognitive paradigms, utilizing functional neuroimaging.This work was supported by the Medical Research Council of South Africa, the Obsessive-Compulsive Foundation (Prof Stein), the National Research Foundation of South Africa (Prof Lochner), an unrestricted grant from Lundbeck H/S and by a Starter Grant for Clinical Lecturers from the Academy of Medical Sciences UK (Dr Chamberlain).This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Springer via http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00213-015-4172-