Matching Items (24)
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- All Subjects: urban planning
- All Subjects: Environmental engineering
- Creators: Salon, Deborah
- Resource Type: Text
Description
It has been identified in the literature that there exists a link between the built environment and non-motorized transport. This study aims to contribute to existing literature on the effects of the built environment on cycling, examining the case of the whole State of California. Physical built environment features are classified into six groups as: 1) local density, 2) diversity of land use, 3) road connectivity, 4) bike route length, 5) green space, 6) job accessibility. Cycling trips in one week for all children, school children, adults and employed-adults are investigated separately. The regression analysis shows that cycling trips is significantly associated with some features of built environment when many socio-demographic factors are taken into account. Street intersections, bike route length tend to increase the use of bicycle. These effects are well-aligned with literature. Moreover, both local and regional job accessibility variables are statistically significant in two adults' models. However, residential density always has a significant negatively effect on cycling trips, which is still need further research to confirm. Also, there is a gap in literature on how green space affects cycling, but the results of this study is still too unclear to make it up. By elasticity analysis, this study concludes that street intersections is the most powerful predictor on cycling trips. From another perspective, the effects of built environment on cycling at workplace (or school) are distinguished from at home. This study implies that a wide range of measures are available for planners to control vehicle travel by improving cycling-level in California.
ContributorsWang, Kailai, M.U.E.P (Author) / Salon, Deborah (Thesis advisor) / Rey, Sergio (Committee member) / Li, Wenwen (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2015
Description
Informal public transport is commonplace in the developing world, but the service exists in the United States as well, and is understudied. Often called "dollar vans", New York's commuter vans serve approximately 120,000 people every day (King and Goldwyn, 2014). While this is a tiny fraction of the New York transit rider population, it is comparable to the total number of commuters who ride transit in smaller cities such as Minneapolis/St Paul and Phoenix. The first part of this study reports on the use of commuter vans in Eastern Queens based on a combination of surveys and a ridership tally, all conducted in summer 2016. It answers four research questions: How many people ride the vans? Who rides the commuter vans? Why do they ride commuter vans? Do commuter vans complement or compete against formal transit? Commuter van ridership in Eastern Queens was approximately 55,000 with a high percentage of female ridership. Time and cost savings were the main factors influencing commuter van ridership. Possession of a MetroCard was shown to negatively affect the frequency of commuter van ridership. The results show evidence of commuter vans playing both a competing and complementary role to MTA bus and subway transit. The second part of this study presents a SWOT analysis results of commuter vans, and the policy implications. It answers 2 research questions: What are the main strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of commuter vans in Eastern Queens? and How do the current policies, rules and regulations affect commuter van operation? The SWOT analysis results show that the commuter van industry is resilient, performs a necessary service, and, with small adjustments that will help reduce operating costs and loss of profits have a chance of thriving in Eastern Queens and the rest of New York City. The study also discusses the mismatch between policy and practice offering recommendations for improvement to ensure that commuter vans continue to serve residents of New York City.
ContributorsMusili, Catherine (Author) / Salon, Deborah (Thesis advisor) / King, David (Committee member) / Kelley, Jason (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2017
Description
This dissertation focuses on the application of urban metabolism metrology (UMM) to process streams of the natural and built water environment to gauge public health concerning exposure to carcinogenic N-nitrosamines and abuse of narcotics. A survey of sources of exposure to N-nitrosamines in the U.S. population identified contaminated food products (1,900 ± 380 ng/day) as important drivers of attributable cancer risk (Chapter 2). Freshwater sediments in the proximity of U.S. municipal wastewater treatment plants were shown for the first time to harbor carcinogenic N-nitrosamine congeners, including N-nitrosodibutylamine (0.2-3.3 ng/g dw), N-nitrosodiphenylamine (0.2-4.7 ng/g dw), and N-nitrosopyrrolidine (3.4-19.6 ng/g dw) were, with treated wastewater discharge representing one potential factor contributing to the observed contamination (p=0.42) (Chapter 3). Opioid abuse rates in two small midwestern communities were estimated through the application of wastewater-based epidemiology (WBE). Average concentrations of opioids (City 1; City 2) were highest for morphine (713 ± 38, 306 ± 29 ng/L) and varied by for the remainder of the screened analytes. Furthermore, concentrations of the powerful opioid fentanyl (1.7 ± 0.2, 1.0 ± 0.5 ng/L) in wastewater were reported for the first time in the literature for the U.S. (Chapter 4). To gauge narcotic consumption within college-aged adults the WBE process used in Chapter 4 was applied to wastewater collected from a large university in the Southwestern U.S. Estimated narcotics consumption, in units of mg/day/1,000 persons showed the following rank order: cocaine (470 ± 42), heroin (474 ± 32), amphetamine (302 ± 14) and methylphenidate (236 ± 28). Most parental drugs and their respective metabolites showed detection frequencies in campus wastewater of 80% or more, with the notable exception of fentanyl, norfentanyl, buprenorphine, and norbuprenorphine. Estimated consumption of all narcotics, aside from attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder medication, were higher than values reported in previous U.S. WBE studies for U.S. campuses (Chapter 5). The analyses presented here have identified variation in narcotic consumption habits across different U.S. communities, which can be gauged through UMM. Application of these techniques should be implemented throughout U.S. communities to provide insight into ongoing substance abuse and health issues within a community.
ContributorsGushgari, Adam Jon (Author) / Halden, Rolf U. (Thesis advisor) / Kavazanjian, Edward (Committee member) / Fraser, Matthew (Committee member) / Venkatesan, Arjun (Committee member) / Mascaro, Giuseppe (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2018
Description
Bicycle sharing systems (BSS) operate on five continents, and they change quickly with technological innovations. The newest “dockless” systems eliminate both docks and stations, and have become popular in China since their launch in 2016. The rapid increase in dockless system use has exposed its drawbacks. Without the order imposed by docks and stations, bike parking has become problematic. In the areas of densest use, the central business districts of large cities, dockless systems have resulted in chaotic piling of bikes and need for frequent rebalancing of bikes to other locations. In low-density zones, on the other hand, it may be difficult for customers to find a bike, and bikes may go unused for long periods. Using big data from the Mobike BSS in Beijing, I analyzed the relationship between building density and the efficiency of dockless BSS. Density is negatively correlated with bicycle idle time, and positively correlated with rebalancing. Understanding the effects of density on BSS efficiency can help BSS operators and municipalities improve the operating efficiency of BSS, increase regional cycling volume, and solve the bicycle rebalancing problem in dockless systems. It can also be useful to cities considering what kind of BSS to adopt.
ContributorsCui, Wencong (Author) / Kuby, Michael (Thesis advisor) / Salon, Deborah (Committee member) / Thigpen, Calvin (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2018
Description
Defines the concept of the arcology as conceived by architect Paolo Soleri. Arcology combines "architecture" and "ecology" and explores a visionary notion of a self-contained urban community that has agricultural, commercial, and residential facilities under one roof. Two real-world examples of these projects are explored: Arcosanti, AZ and Masdar City, Abu Dhabi, UAE. Key aspects of the arcology that could be applied to an existing urban fabric are identified, such as urban design fostering social interaction, reduction of automobile dependency, and a development pattern that combats sprawl. Through interviews with local representatives, a holistic approach to applying arcology concepts to the Phoenix Metro Area is devised.
ContributorsSpencer, Sarah Anne (Author) / Manuel-Navarrete, David (Thesis director) / Salon, Deborah (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Geographical Sciences and Urban Planning (Contributor) / School of Sustainability (Contributor)
Created2015-05
Description
Since 1979, Phoenix has been organized into 15 theoretically self-contained urban villages in order to manage rapid growth. The major objective of the village plan was to decrease demand for personal vehicle use by internalizing travel to the closest village core, or an adjacent village core, instead of expanding travel to one metropolitan core. Phoenix’s transition from a monocentric urban structure to a more polycentric structure has yet to be studied for its efficacy on this goal of turning personal vehicle travel inward. This paper pairs more conventional measures of automobile dependence, such as, use of alternative modes of transportation in place of private vehicle use and commute times, with more nuanced measures of internal travel between work and home, job housing ratio, and job industry breakdowns to describe Phoenix’s reliance on automobiles. Phoenix’s internal travel ratios were higher when compared to adjacent cities and either on-par or lower when compared to non-adjacent cities that were comparable to Phoenix in population density and size.
ContributorsCuiffo, Kathryn Victoria (Author) / King, David (Thesis director) / Salon, Deborah (Committee member) / Dean, W.P. Carey School of Business (Contributor) / Department of Psychology (Contributor) / Department of Economics (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2019-05
Description
Rapid urban expansion and the associated landscape modifications have led to significant changes of surface processes in built environments. These changes further interact with the overlying atmospheric boundary layer and strongly modulate urban microclimate. To capture the impacts of urban land surface processes on urban boundary layer dynamics, a coupled urban land-atmospheric modeling framework has been developed. The urban land surface is parameterized by an advanced single-layer urban canopy model (SLUCM) with realistic representations of urban green infrastructures such as lawn, tree, and green roof, etc. The urban atmospheric boundary layer is simulated by a single column model (SCM) with both convective and stable schemes. This coupled SLUCM-SCM framework can simulate the time evolution and vertical profile of different meteorological variables such as virtual potential temperature, specific humidity and carbon dioxide concentration. The coupled framework has been calibrated and validated in the metropolitan Phoenix area, Arizona. To quantify the model sensitivity, an advanced stochastic approach based on Markov-Chain Monte Carlo procedure has been applied. It is found that the development of urban boundary layer is highly sensitive to surface characteristics of built terrains, including urban land use, geometry, roughness of momentum, and vegetation fraction. In particular, different types of urban vegetation (mesic/xeric) affect the boundary layer dynamics through different mechanisms. Furthermore, this framework can be implanted into large-scale models such as Weather Research and Forecasting model to assess the impact of urbanization on regional climate.
ContributorsSong, Jiyun (Author) / Wang, Zhihua (Thesis advisor) / Vivoni, Enrique R (Committee member) / Mascaro, Giuseppe (Committee member) / Myint, Soe W (Committee member) / Sailor, David (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2016
Description
Bicyclist and pedestrian safety is a growing concern in San Francisco, CA,
especially given the increasing numbers of residents choosing to bike and walk. Sharing
the roads with automobiles, these alternative road users are particularly vulnerable to
sustain serious injuries. With this in mind, it is important to identify the factors that
influence the severity of bicyclist and pedestrian injuries in automobile collisions. This
study uses traffic collision data gathered from California Highway Patrol’s Statewide
Integrated Traffic Records System (SWITRS) to predict the most important
determinants of injury severity, given that a collision has occurred. Multivariate binomial
logistic regression models were created for both pedestrian and bicyclist collisions, with
bicyclist/pedestrian/driver characteristics and built environment characteristics used as
the independent variables. Results suggest that bicycle infrastructure is not an important
predictor of bicyclist injury severity, but instead bicyclist age, race, sobriety, and speed
played significant roles. Pedestrian injuries were influenced by pedestrian and driver age
and sobriety, crosswalk use, speed limit, and the type of vehicle at fault in the collision.
Understanding these key determinants that lead to severe and fatal injuries can help
local communities implement appropriate safety measures for their most susceptible
road users.
especially given the increasing numbers of residents choosing to bike and walk. Sharing
the roads with automobiles, these alternative road users are particularly vulnerable to
sustain serious injuries. With this in mind, it is important to identify the factors that
influence the severity of bicyclist and pedestrian injuries in automobile collisions. This
study uses traffic collision data gathered from California Highway Patrol’s Statewide
Integrated Traffic Records System (SWITRS) to predict the most important
determinants of injury severity, given that a collision has occurred. Multivariate binomial
logistic regression models were created for both pedestrian and bicyclist collisions, with
bicyclist/pedestrian/driver characteristics and built environment characteristics used as
the independent variables. Results suggest that bicycle infrastructure is not an important
predictor of bicyclist injury severity, but instead bicyclist age, race, sobriety, and speed
played significant roles. Pedestrian injuries were influenced by pedestrian and driver age
and sobriety, crosswalk use, speed limit, and the type of vehicle at fault in the collision.
Understanding these key determinants that lead to severe and fatal injuries can help
local communities implement appropriate safety measures for their most susceptible
road users.
ContributorsMcIntyre, Andrew (Author) / Salon, Deborah (Thesis advisor) / Kuby, Mike (Committee member) / Chester, Mikhail (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2016
Description
The combination of rapid urban growth and climate change places stringent constraints on multisector sustainability of cities. Green infrastructure provides a great potential for mitigating anthropogenic-induced urban environmental problems; nevertheless, studies at city and regional scales are inhibited by the deficiency in modelling the complex transport coupled water and energy inside urban canopies. This dissertation is devoted to incorporating hydrological processes and urban green infrastructure into an integrated atmosphere-urban modelling system, with the goal to improve the reliability and predictability of existing numerical tools. Based on the enhanced numerical tool, the effects of urban green infrastructure on environmental sustainability of cities are examined.
Findings indicate that the deployment of green roofs will cool the urban environment in daytime and warm it at night, via evapotranspiration and soil insulation. At the annual scale, green roofs are effective in decreasing building energy demands for both summer cooling and winter heating. For cities in arid and semiarid environments, an optimal trade-off between water and energy resources can be achieved via innovative design of smart urban irrigation schemes, enabled by meticulous analysis of the water-energy nexus. Using water-saving plants alleviates water shortage induced by population growth, but comes at the price of an exacerbated urban thermal environment. Realizing the potential water buffering capacity of urban green infrastructure is crucial for the long-term water sustainability and subsequently multisector sustainability of cities. Environmental performance of urban green infrastructure is determined by land-atmosphere interactions, geographic and meteorological conditions, and hence it is recommended that analysis should be conducted on a city-by-city basis before actual implementation of green infrastructure.
Findings indicate that the deployment of green roofs will cool the urban environment in daytime and warm it at night, via evapotranspiration and soil insulation. At the annual scale, green roofs are effective in decreasing building energy demands for both summer cooling and winter heating. For cities in arid and semiarid environments, an optimal trade-off between water and energy resources can be achieved via innovative design of smart urban irrigation schemes, enabled by meticulous analysis of the water-energy nexus. Using water-saving plants alleviates water shortage induced by population growth, but comes at the price of an exacerbated urban thermal environment. Realizing the potential water buffering capacity of urban green infrastructure is crucial for the long-term water sustainability and subsequently multisector sustainability of cities. Environmental performance of urban green infrastructure is determined by land-atmosphere interactions, geographic and meteorological conditions, and hence it is recommended that analysis should be conducted on a city-by-city basis before actual implementation of green infrastructure.
ContributorsYang, Jiachuan (Author) / Wang, Zhihua (Thesis advisor) / Kaloush, Kamil (Committee member) / Myint, Soe (Committee member) / Huang, Huei-Ping (Committee member) / Mascaro, Giuseppe (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2016
Description
Land surface fluxes of energy and mass developed over heterogeneous mountain landscapes are fundamental to atmospheric processes. However, due to their high complexity and the lack of spatial observations, land surface processes and land-atmosphere interactions are not fully understood in mountain regions. This thesis investigates land surface processes and their impact on convective precipitation by conducting numerical modeling experiments at multiple scales over the North American Monsoon (NAM) region. Specifically, the following scientific questions are addressed: (1) how do land surface conditions evolve during the monsoon season, and what are their main controls?, (2) how do the diurnal cycles of surface energy fluxes vary during the monsoon season for the major ecosystems?, and (3) what are the impacts of surface soil moisture and vegetation condition on convective precipitation?
Hydrologic simulation using the TIN-based Real-time Integrated Basin Simulator (tRIBS) is firstly carried out to examine the seasonal evolution of land surface conditions. Results reveal that the spatial heterogeneity of land surface temperature and soil moisture increases dramatically with the onset of monsoon, which is related to seasonal changes in topographic and vegetation controls. Similar results are found at regional basin scale using the uncoupled WRF-Hydro model. Meanwhile, the diurnal cycles of surface energy fluxes show large variation between the major ecosystems. Differences in both the peak magnitude and peak timing of plant transpiration induce mesoscale heterogeneity in land surface conditions. Lastly, this dissertation examines the upscale effect of land surface heterogeneity on atmospheric condition through fully-coupled WRF-Hydro simulations. A series of process-based experiments were conducted to identify the pathways of soil moisture-rainfall feedback mechanism over the NAM region. While modeling experiments confirm the existence of positive soil moisture/vegetation-rainfall feedback, their exact pathways are slightly different. Interactions between soil moisture, vegetation cover, and rainfall through a series of land surface and atmospheric boundary layer processes highlight the strong land-atmosphere coupling in the NAM region, and have important implications on convective rainfall prediction. Overall, this dissertation advances the study of complex land surface processes over the NAM region, and made important contributions in linking complex hydrologic, ecologic and atmospheric processes through numerical modeling.
Hydrologic simulation using the TIN-based Real-time Integrated Basin Simulator (tRIBS) is firstly carried out to examine the seasonal evolution of land surface conditions. Results reveal that the spatial heterogeneity of land surface temperature and soil moisture increases dramatically with the onset of monsoon, which is related to seasonal changes in topographic and vegetation controls. Similar results are found at regional basin scale using the uncoupled WRF-Hydro model. Meanwhile, the diurnal cycles of surface energy fluxes show large variation between the major ecosystems. Differences in both the peak magnitude and peak timing of plant transpiration induce mesoscale heterogeneity in land surface conditions. Lastly, this dissertation examines the upscale effect of land surface heterogeneity on atmospheric condition through fully-coupled WRF-Hydro simulations. A series of process-based experiments were conducted to identify the pathways of soil moisture-rainfall feedback mechanism over the NAM region. While modeling experiments confirm the existence of positive soil moisture/vegetation-rainfall feedback, their exact pathways are slightly different. Interactions between soil moisture, vegetation cover, and rainfall through a series of land surface and atmospheric boundary layer processes highlight the strong land-atmosphere coupling in the NAM region, and have important implications on convective rainfall prediction. Overall, this dissertation advances the study of complex land surface processes over the NAM region, and made important contributions in linking complex hydrologic, ecologic and atmospheric processes through numerical modeling.
ContributorsXiang, Tiantian (Author) / Vivoni, Enrique R (Thesis advisor) / Gochis, David J (Committee member) / Huang, Huei-Ping (Committee member) / Mascaro, Giuseppe (Committee member) / Wang, Zhihua (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2016