Observing the Basics: Remembering Wilfred Owen

Author(s):  
Mathew J. Betz

The conference presents a unique opportunity to recognize the contributions of Wilfred Owen to the field of low-volume roads and their application to the problems of today and tomorrow. Owen was the transportation expert for the Brookings Institution for about four decades. Besides being interested in the theories and principles of low-volume roads, Owen was vitally concerned with the rural and urban needy throughout the world. He believed that the development of transport and the economic opportunities that would ensue would benefit them significantly. Few have had more impact on the provision and improvement of low-volume roads in developing countries than Wilfred Owen. He was the author of many studies of specific countries in addition to several books. His major emphasis was on the need to identify and grasp the basics of economic evaluation and, more important, the basic premises and goals for investing in transport to facilitate economic development. Owen’s second major emphasis was on well-founded and rational planning. He focused on the need for change, including the reorganization of international efforts to address the global transportation problem. In 1983 Wilfred Owen was the keynote speaker at the Third International Conference on Low-Volume Roads. His topics that day included a shrinking planet, integrated global economies, world population growth, global disparities, and development of an international cooperative effort. He had completed his last book shortly before his death in November 2001.

2003 ◽  
Vol 1819 (1) ◽  
pp. 397-404
Author(s):  
Francesco M. Russo ◽  
Terry J. Wipf ◽  
F. Wayne Klaiber

Nearly half of the 587,000 bridges in excess of 6.1 m (20 ft) long on public roads in the United States are located off the Federal Aid System, are on local rural and urban roads or rural minor collectors, and are classified as off-system bridges. Approximately one-third of the off-system bridges are structurally deficient or functionally obsolete. The majority of states with large bridge populations are rural states with large percentages of structures owned by counties and other local agencies. Many of these bridges are on low-volume roads. Given the size of the deficient bridge population and the concentration of these bridges largely on locally owned networks, a recent NCHRP synthesis (NCHRP 32-08, Cost Effective Structures for Off-System Bridges) has explored the current practices regarding the maintenance, rehabilitation, and replacement of off-system bridges. The administrative aspects of off-system bridge ownership and management were explored, including sources and problems of funding, bridge asset management, design policies for off-system bridges, exploration of the environmental process, and discussions of interagency partnering and coordination problems. A significant body of work exists on effective bridge maintenance and rehabilitation. A significant discussion of bridge strengthening, including specific techniques used on low-volume-road bridges, was also examined. Concerning bridge replacements, the literature and owner survey were used to provide information on successful concepts currently being used. In addition to successful bridge replacement options, discussion of the use of standard plans, design aids, and software is promoted as leading to standard and efficient low-volume-road bridge replacements.


Author(s):  
Shubhanshu Gupta ◽  
Sanjeev Kumar ◽  
Piyush D Swami ◽  
Anjana Niranjan

Background: According to World Health Organization, adolescents constitute about one fifth of the world population, and in India they constitute about 21% of the total population. Most of the surveys show that health status of adolescent girls is at sub-optimal level. Objectives: To assess nutritional status and morbidity pattern among the adolescent girls and to suggest measures for improvement of health status of adolescent girls.  Method: A community based cross-sectional study was carried out among 250 adolescent schoolgirls in Rural and urban field practice area of Jhansi school from January 2017 to July 2014. Results: Among the various morbidities eye problem was seen in maximum no of adolescent girls. Eye problem was present in 44.8% of adolescent girls followed by respiratory 14.7% and ear 13.06% disease. Skin disease was present in 3.2% of adolescent girls, which was more in rural girls 6.7% than in urban girls 1.7%, may be due to better hygienic practice in urban schoolgirls. Conclusions: Rural background, low socioeconomic status, illiteracy, birth rate and order, income and number of members in a family have shown to be significant determinants of morbidity pattern in the adolescent girls. Keywords: Adolescent, anemia, morbidity, vaginal discharge.


Author(s):  
Suraj Pinate ◽  
Hitesh Sonawane ◽  
Jayesh Barhate ◽  
Mayur Chaudhari ◽  
Utkarsha Dhok ◽  
...  

Author(s):  
Affan Habib ◽  
Mustaque Hossain ◽  
Rajesh Kaldate ◽  
Glenn Fager

Superpave and Marshall mix designs using local aggregates were done to study the suitability of the Superpave mix design as compared with the Marshall mix design for low-volume roads, especially shoulders. The project site was Kansas Route 177 in northeast Kansas. Three locally available aggregates, crushed limestone and coarse and fine river sands, were used in this study. Five blends with varying proportions of coarse and fine river sands were selected. Mix samples were compacted in the Superpave gyratory compactor with the applicable number of gyrations and were compacted with the Marshall hammer by using 50 blows per face. Bulk densities of the compacted samples and maximum specific gravities of loose samples also were measured for each blend. The results show that the Superpave mix design for low-volume roads and shoulders results in lower estimated asphalt content than does the Marshall method. The required asphalt content increases as the proportion of coarse river sand increases in the mix. Superpave requirements for the voids filled with asphalt (VFA) for low-volume traffic, that is, less than 0.3 million equivalent single-axle loads, appeared to be too high. High asphalt film thicknesses were computed for the mixtures that did not meet the Superpave VFA requirements. Lowering the design number of gyrations (Ndes) for compaction of samples would result in increased asphalt requirement for the Superpave mixture with a given gradation.


2013 ◽  
Vol 29 (1) ◽  
pp. 155-175 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas L. Holzer ◽  
James C. Savage

Modern global earthquake fatalities can be separated into two components: (1) fatalities from an approximately constant annual background rate that is independent of world population growth and (2) fatalities caused by earthquakes with large human death tolls, the frequency of which is dependent on world population. Earthquakes with death tolls greater than 100,000 (and 50,000) have increased with world population and obey a nonstationary Poisson distribution with rate proportional to population. We predict that the number of earthquakes with death tolls greater than 100,000 (50,000) will increase in the 21st century to 8.7±3.3 (20.5±4.3) from 4 (7) observed in the 20th century if world population reaches 10.1 billion in 2100. Combining fatalities caused by the background rate with fatalities caused by catastrophic earthquakes ( >100,000 fatalities) indicates global fatalities in the 21st century will be 2.57±0.64 million if the average post-1900 death toll for catastrophic earthquakes (193,000) is assumed.


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