Alexandre G. de Barros

Severity of motorcycle crashes in Calgary

Motorcycle riders would be more vulnerable in the event of a crash because of their lack of protection which would often result in them suffering more severe injuries than car drivers. This paper estimated three crash severity models to identify factors that contributed to increasing the severity of motorcycle involved crashes in the Canadian City of Calgary. We found that results from the ordered logit model, heterogeneous choice model and partially constrained generalized ordered logit model produced estimates that were very similar which attested to their robustness. Injury severity tended to increase in neighborhoods with loops and lollipops types of streets or involved right-angle and left-turn-across-path crashes, a truck, unsafe speed or alcohol use but tended to decrease if the crash occurred in parking lots or during winter, involved a van or male rider, or a rider following-too-closely to the vehicle in front.

Urban Street Pattern and Pedestrian Traffic Safety

This study examined the effect of different urban street patterns on vehicle-pedestrian crash severity. Pedestrian crash data for the City of Calgary for the years 2003–2005 were used to estimate a partially constrained generalized ordered logit model. Besides street pattern, many variables related to drivers, road, environment and traffic characteristics were used as control variables. The results indicated that currently popular urban street patterns, like loops and lollipops design, were found to be associated with higher pedestrian crash severity, when compared to the traditional gridiron pattern.

Optimal terminal configurations for new large aircraft operations

Abstract This paper analyses passenger terminal configurations for accommodating new large aircraft (NLA) operations. NLA are new aircraft developments larger than the Boeing 747, of which the Airbus A380, scheduled to enter service in 2006, is the most prominent example. The analysis is performed individually for a single pier, several types of pier–satellites, and a set of remote parallel piers connected by an automated people mover (APM). In all cases, the best location for the NLA gate positions is sought, using analytical models. The overall disutility of walking and riding APM is taken as the criterion for optimality.

Reinforcement Learning Agents to Tactical Air Traffic Flow Management

Air traffic flow management (ATFM) is of crucial importance for the airspace control system, due to two factors: first, the impact of ATFM on air traffic control, including inherent safety implications on air operations; second, the possible consequences of ATFM measures on airport operations. Thus, it is imperative to establish procedures and develop systems that help traffic flow managers to take optimal actions. In this context, this work presents a comparative study of ATFM measures generated by a computational agent based on artificial intelligence (reinforcement learning). The goal of the agent is to establish delays upon takeoff schedules of aircraft departing from certain terminal areas so as to avoid congestion or saturation in the air traffic control sectors due to a possible imbalance between demand and capacity. The paper includes a case study comparing the ATFM measures generated by the agent autonomously and measures generated taking into account the experience of human traffic flow managers. The experiments showed satisfactory results.

Designing the airport airside for the new large aircraft

Aircraft manufacturers are developing double decked aircraft known as new large aircraft (NLA) to cope with the growth in demand for air transportation. Because of the greater dimensions, the introduction will require changes in the airside configuration of practically all airports where they are to operate. Even for new airports, revised standards may be necessary to take into consideration the innovative technological features that will be present on those aircraft. This paper reviews the main issues related to the compatibility of the NLA with the airport airside and the related solutions that have been proposed.

Urban design and planning influences on the share of trips taken by cycling

Abstract This study examines the effect of different street pattern, road infrastructure and other physical attributes on the share of bicycle trips in a community area. Using the 2011 census data and the road infrastructure data of Calgary city, the study finds that different street patterns have significant effects on bicycle usage and thus, should be considered in the development of new communities for promoting active transport. Also, increases in the percentage of green space (agricultural and park areas) and semi-detached houses are associated with greater bicycle use, whereas an increase in the number and/or size (area) of road intersections is associated with reduced bicycle use relative to other modes of transport.

Sustainable integration of airports into urban planning – a review

Traditional airport planning and design considers the airport as an isolated entity accessed by aircraft and passengers. However, airports are rarely the final destination of air passengers – these have a need to access the airport from a widely distributed set of origins/destinations. The surface portion of air trips has a significant impact on the urban transportation system. In addition, airports also affect the land use in their vicinities due both to the noise generated by low-flying aircraft and the need to protect the airspace used by those some aircraft from obstacles protruding from the ground. This article reviews the most important issues associated with integrating airports into the urban environment in a sustainable manner.Traditional airport planning and design considers the airport as an isolated entity accessed by aircraft and passengers. However, airports are rarely the final destination of air passengers - these have a need to access the airport from a widely distributed set of origins/destinations. The surface portion of air trips has a significant impact on the urban transportation system. In addition, airports also affect the land use in their vicinities due both to the noise generated by low-flying aircraft and the need to protect the airspace used by those some aircraft from obstacles protruding from the ground. This article reviews the most important issues associated with integrating airports into the urban environment in a sustainable manner.

Expected Effects of In-Service Road Safety Reviews

Despite the popularity of in-service road safety review as an effective tool to identify the safety problems on roads, there have been very few studies performed to gauge its benefits. This study analysed collision data on selected in- service road safety review locations in Alberta to examine whether the reviews are associated with any reduction in collisions on roads to provide policy makers with some evidence on which to base future investment decisions. Our results showed that the expected reductions in collision are highly sensitive to the evaluation methodology used. Association of Canada (TAC) has recently published two guides to conducting road safety audits (5) and in-service road safety reviews (6). The Alberta Traffic Safety Plan has also recommended maintaining the governments commitment to ongoing road safety audits and in-service road safety reviews to improve road safety. Despite the increasing use of such reviews and the enormous amount of resources invested to improve safety on Albertan roads, very few studies have been conducted to examine the overall effectiveness of conducting these reviews. Though there have been some studies around the globe on the effectiveness of such reviews, these evaluations (7-8) tend to focus on the success or failure of the implemented recommendations and not on the impact of the review itself. The decision to invest in the review however, has to be based solely on the expected benefits of conducting the review itself and not on the expected benefits of implementing the individual recommendations from the review. Hence, there is a strong need to look at the effectiveness of such reviews in the aggregate level in order to make proper use of economic resources in future. The purpose of this paper is to examine the effectiveness of in- service road safety reviews in Alberta to get an insight on whether such reviews are, on average, expected to reduce the number of collisions on roads. In addition, this study will also examine the robustness of the result with respect to different model specifications and evaluation methods used.