Journal of Urban Planning and Development

Sampling is one approach used to survey the origin-destination (O-D) trip matrix. However, when the sampling rate is not sufficiently large compared to the population, the sampling data may have missing values in O-D pairs and that makes the O-D matrix incomplete. Two imputation methods to solve the problem mentioned previously are presented in this study. The Deming-Stephan (D-S) proportional fitting procedure is a statistical method first proposed to impute the missing value in this study. The improved D-S method, its convergence is proved by Cauchy criteria in this study, applies the iteration conception in the D-S method to solve the incomplete data problem. One numerical example displayed in this study shows that the improved D-S method produces an estimated O-D table with similar pattern as that of the population table.

We present a prototype spreadsheet-based and geographic information system-based model, EmiquonViz, developed to examine the economic, fiscal, and social impacts of development. The model is designed to facilitate examination of hypothetical scenarios related to introducing recreational use and siting a lodging facility within a naturalized floodplain. In building the model we draw on the ongoing floodplain naturalization efforts in the middle reach of the Illinois River and assume that the new development would amount to a park of at least regional and possibly state stature; it would, therefore, attract nonlocal visitors and generate impacts on the local communities. EmiquonViz is implemented in ArcView 3.3 using the CommunityViz Scenario Constructor extension. Its purpose is to serve as a decision-making tool for planners and other community members concerned with the impact of recreational and tourism-related activities.

The detection and analysis of land use changes in the urban environment is an important issue in planning. Remote sensing and geographic information systems are considered as the most efficient techniques for this type of studies. These techniques had been applied to investigate the effects of urbanization on fertile lands and to quantify urban growth of Amman area. Five land covers were identified in space and time using aerial photographs, LANDSAT and IKONOS images acquired at different dates. The study showed that the urban area was increased by $162{\mathrm{km}}^2$ over the period 1918–2002, which represents 509 times the original urban area. The fertile lands decreased by $86{\mathrm{km}}^2$ , which represents 23% of loss. Moreover, the urban expansion over 1918–2002 was analyzed and its impacts on the Amman area environment were assessed. The results of our study were compared to other similar studies for Istanbul and Bangkok. The comparison showed that Amman has the largest percent annual rate of urban expansion.

Communication, visibility, and control of materials across the supply chain are necessary components for an efficient supply chain management system. However, the current supply chain management system in the manufactured housing industry is not able to control the flow of materials efficiently across the extended supply chain. This need has led to the development of an ARENA based supply chain simulation model to identify key bottlenecks in the entire supply chain flow and various experimental design alternatives have been tested. As a result, an optimized new supply chain management system with an online ordering capability is proposed for the manufactured housing industry. However, this optimized relationship among the relevant parties throughout the supply chain is not limited to the manufactured housing industry but it is expected to have the potential contribution to improve overall efficiency of housing practitioners in urban planning and community development.

Assessing the performance of transit systems operating under different regulatory regimes is a topic of considerable interest in the literature. The goal of this paper is to investigate the performance characteristics and factors affecting this performance for European transit systems operating in vastly different regulatory environments. The initial results of data envelopment analysis application indicate that privately operated systems tend to be more efficient while publicly operated systems tend to be more effective; transport operators in cities where open entry form of competition has been introduced were found to perform both efficiently and effectively. Further, as the Tobit regressions focused on the effect of ownership indicate, most systems in the sample demonstrate a positive trend in both efficiency and effectiveness, a finding with important practical implications for financially strained systems.

This study formulates a commuters’ mode and route choice model as well as a households’ residential choice model on a two-dimensional space. The commuters’ mode and route choice model assumes that commuters select the mode and route alternative based on the least generalized travel cost. The households’ residential choice model is formulated to maximize households’ residential utilities subject to time and budget constraints. A simulation method is adopted to simulate household choice behavior and solve the households’ residential location choice model with two-dimensional decision variables to prevent aggregation bias. A case study for Taipei metropolitan area is illustrated to analyze the variations of residential location choices for households working in the central business district (CBD) after different lines of Taipei Rapid Transit System are completed at various stages. Results indicate that (1) there is increased attraction of households in cities of Taipei County such as Pan-Chiao, Chung-Ho, Yong-Her, and Hsin-Tien due to the completion of rail transit networks and (2) residential locations better served by rail transit lines attract more households; thereby, resulting in higher residential densities.

North American cities have been evolving from monocentric to polycentric metropolitan regions, with multiple concentrations of activities occurring outside of traditional urban cores. This new urban structure, with multiple urban “activity centers,” has profound influence on the functioning of cities, particularly transportation systems. This paper reviews the development of “activity center” definitions from various research fields, and concludes that the application of contemporary definitions to transportation analyses has significant weaknesses, particularly in analyzing suburban agglomerations of activities. An alternative method is suggested which incorporates not only the presence of concentrated employment, the traditional criteria, but also the trip-attracting strength of the employment types present in an activity center. The Philadelphia metropolitan area is analyzed using traditional definitions and the proposed methodology; several areas which would not be identified using traditional definitions meet the new criteria. The impact of these “transportation activity centers” on Philadelphia’s travel patterns is explored.