Major Transport Infrastructure Research Articles

Research on Critical Factors Influencing Organizational Resilience of Major Transportation Infrastructure Projects: A Hybrid Fuzzy DEMATEL-ISM-MICMAC Approach

To strengthen major transportation infrastructure projects’ (MTIPs’) organizational resilience and fortify their capacity for crisis management and project risk prevention. In this paper, based on the resilience theory development process, the connotation of organizational resilience of MTIPs is defined, and 20 influencing factors of organizational resilience of MTIPs are extracted from four categories of stability, redundancy, adaptability, and rapidity according to the literature analysis and case study method. The significance, causality, and multilevel recursive order structure of the influencing factors were investigated by the fuzzy DEMATEL-ISM approach, and their driving and dependent characteristics were analyzed through MICMAC. The results indicate that risk warning and prediction, human resources management, inter-organizational synergies, resource reserve situations, organizational leadership, and organizational learning are the crucial factors of organizational resilience in MTIPs. There are three levels and five ranks in the multilevel recursive rank structure of the factors affecting MTIPs’ organizational resilience. Among them, risk warning and prediction, equipment condition and performance, human resources management, and organizational leadership have the deepest impact on organizational resilience in MTIPs. The findings can clarify ideas for subsequent research on organizational resilience in this area and inform project decision-makers in developing strategies for optimizing organizational resilience.

Travel Behavior during the 2021 British Columbia Floods Using De-identified Network Mobility Data

This study investigates residents’ emergent travel behavior before, during, and after the 2021 British Columbia Floods. Using de-identified network mobility data, we analyze travel patterns centered around the municipality of Hope in British Columbia, Canada. Our findings reveal significant drops in travel during the peak of the floods, corresponding with major transportation infrastructure failure. The slow recovery process and dispersed residents highlight the insufficient resilience of key transportation corridors. Furthermore, the results underscore the importance of network mobility data being: 1) privacy-protected, 2) efficient and easy to examine, and 3) adaptable.

Indigenous Knowledge for Sustainable Communications and Mobility: Perspectives from the Kolyma Road, Northeast Russia

In northeast Russia, the famous historic Kolyma Road spans two thousand kilometers across two federal subjects of the Russian Federation: the Sakha Republic (Yakutia) and Magadan Oblast. Thousands of people live along and in close proximity to the road, depending on it for communication, mobility, goods, and life support. As the major transportation infrastructure in the entire region, it should be reliable and stable for local communities’ well-being. One strategic approach to ensure its reliability is to acknowledge the role of Indigenous knowledge, which has been neglected despite being established long before the emergence of existing formal systems of communication. Based on data collected through fieldwork, personal observations, and conversations, this paper aims to demonstrate that Indigenous knowledge regarding ways of living, moving, and communicating along and on the road is the key to sustainability in the region. As a result, we claim that this realization should be manifested in designing and implementing communication and mobility systems based on the principles of diversity, equity, and inclusion. In the long term, it is necessary to develop a sustainable road management system for the Kolyma Road to ensure the security and well-being of local communities and for everyone visiting and working on the road.

Wellbeing Impact Study of High-Speed 2 (WISH2): Protocol for a mixed-methods examination of the impact of major transport infrastructure development on mental health and wellbeing.

Although research has demonstrated that transport infrastructure development can have positive and negative health-related impacts, most of this research has not considered mental health and wellbeing separately from physical health. There is also limited understanding of whether and how any effects might be experienced differently across population groups, whether this differs according to the stage of development (e.g. planning, construction), and how changes to planned infrastructure may affect mental health and wellbeing. This paper presents a protocol for the Wellbeing Impact Study of HS2 (WISH2), which seeks to address these questions using a high-speed rail development in the UK as an applied example. WISH2 is a 10-year, integrated, longitudinal, mixed-methods project using general practices (primary medical care providers in the UK) as an avenue for participant recruitment and for providing a geographically defined population for which aggregated data on mental health indicators are available. The research comprises: (i) a combined longitudinal and repeated cross-sectional cohort study involving multiple waves of survey data collection and data from medical records; (ii) longitudinal, semi-structured interviews and focus groups with residents and community stakeholders from exposed areas; (iii) analysis of administrative data aggregated at the general practice population level; and (iv) health economic analysis of mental health and wellbeing impacts. The study findings will support the development of strategies to reduce negative impacts and/or enhance positive mental health and wellbeing impacts of high-speed rail developments and other large-scale infrastructure projects.

School accessibility assessment for walking and cycling; the role of street connectivity and land use variables

ABSTRACT Walking and cycling are not just physical activities; they are essential transport modes for students in most rural parts of Africa. Therefore, calling for their promotion without critically examining accessibility in a context where the effect of distance-related land use variables and streets -a major active transport infrastructure - are assessed, leads to a futile agenda in the continent. This study seeks to address this by applying the three-step catchment floating method to assess education/school accessibility through walking and cycling in the Ayawaso East Municipal Assembly (AEMA) and Tamale Metropolitan Assembly (TaMA) in Ghana. Additionally, the differences in accessibility, along with the association of street connectivity and land use variables such as the number and density of schools and catchment areas with education/school accessibility are determined by correlation and Mann–Whitney’s U-tests. The findings revealed a poorly connected dendritic road network system at both locations and shortcomings in school and street network planning that have left some communities vulnerable to low education opportunities. Without policy and planning interventions to address school siting and improve street connectivity, walking and cycling will not only be hindered, but education for some communities, particularly in TaMA may be compromised.

Bridging the evidence gap in spatial planning

The article focuses on how the use of evidence in spatial planning could bridge the gap between vision and reality through the continuous evaluation of the spatial impacts of the proposed interventions. The introduction sets the theoretical, institutional, and practical context on how evidence is used to assess these impacts in relation to both the expected outcomes and the pursued policy priorities. The research section addresses these issues based on the empirical and methodological background derived from a series of successive studies carried out between 1999 and 2014. These studies are related to the establishment and operation of the spatial impact observatory of the Egnatia motorway, a major European transport infrastructure project in northern Greece. The results section introduces a methodological approach, succinctly referred to as the IRIS model in which spatial planning is conceived as an adaptive process, and the use of evidence aims to enhance its flexibility and preparedness in dealing with the uncertainties that arise from dynamic conditions, rather than relying solely on predetermined solutions. It comprises three key components: a theoretical model that simulates the relationship between transport infrastructure and spatial development, an intermediate data model in which raw data were constructed as evidence indicators, and a combination of inductive and deductive paths in which evidence is used to assess the anticipated impact of spatial plans and to evaluate the actual spatial outcomes after their implementation. Finally, the conclusions underline the value added of the IRIS approach as a comprehensive and integrative methodology that aims to improve the efficacy of spatial planning by establishing a link between theoretical models, policy objectives, and evidence-based decision-making.

Integrated intelligent decision support model for ranking regional transport infrastructure programmes based on performance assessment

In recent years, major regional transport infrastructure programmes have been adopted throughout the African continent. However, it has been noticed that while some programmes seem to be more effective, others have shown opposite outcomes. On this point, understanding the difference in the execution outcomes of these programmes is important for stakeholders. In this study, an improved fuzzy Step-Wise Weight Assessment Ratio Analysis based on the fuzzy Bonferroni aggregator is integrated with fuzzy Measurement of Alternatives and Ranking according to COmpromise Solution to assess the most critical factors affecting the performance of the African regional infrastructure programmes and identify the best regional transportation infrastructure programme based on its performance. Four regional transportation infrastructure programmes are considered. To rank these programmes, five criteria are defined. The results show that “leadership” and “availability of finance” are the most critical factors while the fourth alternative “East African road network project” is the best alternative among the four possible programmes. The robustness of the proposed methodology is validated through a three-phase sensitivity analysis. The results confirmed the stability and applicability of the proposed methodology.

Cost Underruns in Major Road Transport Infrastructure Projects—The Surprising Experience of Poland

This paper investigates the reasons behind the surprising cost performance of road construction projects in Poland. In particular, in order to explain the phenomenon of cost underruns, the role of regulations related to the national and the European Union structural investment funding is verified. It is shown that in Poland there exist two different institutional frameworks related to infrastructure investment projects. However, in the case of road transport infrastructure investment, the public investor does not discriminate between the sources of funding and follows the optimal strategy for the EU co-funded projects. This, in turn, leads to the emergence of cost underruns.

An Efficient Real-Time Vehicle Monitoring Method

As the major transportation infrastructure, roads play an important role in intelligent transportation system. However, the intelligent level of roads is insufficient currently, which does not match the development needs of autonomous vehicles in the near future. In order to improve the intelligence level of road infrastructures, a distributed acceleration sensing node array was embedded in the pavement to collect pavement vibration signals under the action of vehicle moving load to sense the traffic information. A complete set of processing algorithms, including raw data preprocessing algorithm, same vehicle judgment algorithm and vehicle information analysis algorithm, is proposed to extract the traffic information from the monitored vibration data. The traffic information such as vehicle speed, axle numbers, wheelbases, load position, and traffic flows are obtained. The acquired traffic information can support intelligent traffic control as well as scientific road maintenance.

Ecological vulnerability assessment of the Ya’an-Qamdo section along the southern route of the Sichuan-Tibet transportation corridor

Identifying the ecological vulnerability of the sensitive and fragile ecosystem of the Ya’an-Qamdo section along the southern route of the Sichuan-Tibet transport corridor is of paramount importance to reduce environmental damage resulting from infrastructure construction. This paper divided the Ya’an-Qamdo transport section into 22 subzones according to their ecological environment characteristics. Based on the vulnerability evaluation model established by the fuzzy matter-element analysis method, the eight main assessment indicators of ecological vulnerability were windstorm, rainstorm, snowstorm, extreme temperature, extreme air pressure, geological hazard, natural conditions, and social resources. The rating and ranking of vulnerability in each subzone were based on the weight of the judgment indicators. Scientific processes were used to verify the rationality of both the indicators themselves and their weights. The results of this study show that subzone 9, located in the subalpine cold and humid forest and scrubland zone, is the most vulnerable, and subzone 1, located in the low- to mid-land warm and humid forest zone, is the least vulnerable. The conclusion of the study suggests that targeted measures of ecological protection should be formulated before development and construction of major transportation infrastructure. Construction should evade the most vulnerable areas, and in-depth research on ecological restoration should be carried out in low- to mid-vulnerability areas so that the ecological environment along the route can be protected effectively for sustainable economic and social development.

Changing Realities: China-Africa Infrastructure Development

Changing Realities:China-Africa Infrastructure Development Mandira Bagwandeen (bio) Through an extensive portfolio of infrastructure investments, China has played a crucial role in helping Africa reduce deficits in its infrastructure. Over the past decade and a half, Chinese state-owned or state-aligned construction and engineering companies have strategically entered African markets with assistance from the Chinese government. Under China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), Chinese companies took on mega-infrastructure projects, especially in the energy and transport sectors, that could aid African countries with achieving higher levels of development. However, these mega-BRI projects came with hefty price tags that have contributed to compounding the debt stress of several African nations. In this regard, many international (and especially Western) actors have accused China of predatory lending practices and debt-trap diplomacy. This narrative has been further amplified amid the Covid-19 pandemic, which has had significant ramifications for BRI projects in Africa and around the world. The pandemic has created some doubt about whether Chinese-funded and–built infrastructure projects can be completed and, more importantly, whether African states have the fiscal capacity to repay these development loans. With reduced revenues available to African governments, the risk of defaulting on loan repayments is high. Moreover, because of the burden of loan repayments, African states are handicapped in their response measures to Covid-19 and its economic consequences. The Eighth Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) in November 2021 demonstrated that due to changing realities—including China's domestic economic concerns, U.S.-China trade tensions, the global economic impact of Covid-19, and Africa's pandemic-induced debt stress—Beijing seems to have realized that it cannot continue to be Africa's go-to bank for financing infrastructure development. This essay outlines that China may not be as willing as it was in past years to finance infrastructure development projects in Africa. It explores the impact of Covid-19 on the development of BRI infrastructure projects in Africa and briefly assesses the validity of the debt-trap and predatory lending accusations leveled against China. Additionally, the essay addresses [End Page 18] the Eighth FOCAC summit, which indicated that China is likely to reduce its focus on development financing for hard infrastructure in its cooperation with African countries. China's Belt and Road Infrastructure in Africa and Covid-19 As of 2019, China was the single-largest source of finance for African infrastructure, having "finance[d] one in five projects and construct[ed] one in three."1 Although the continent's enormous infrastructural investment gap cannot solely be met by Chinese financing, Beijing's role in contributing to the development of the region's infrastructure has been crucial. The China-Africa infrastructure partnership was strengthened under the impetus of BRI, which was introduced in 2013. The initiative closely centers on the Chinese proverb that "if you want to get rich, build a road first" and the argument that "infrastructure investments presuppose economic growth and enhance quality of life."2 This logic is particularly appealing to African states that are desperate to reduce their deficits in infrastructure. Several African scholars have opined that BRI could play a critical role in Africa's industrialization and infrastructure development through the building of synergies between Agenda 2063, the pan-African development plan of the African Union (AU), and BRI.3 Even individual African leaders and the AU welcomed China's infrastructural drive on the continent motivated by BRI. In January 2015, China and the AU signed a memorandum of understanding to cooperate on developing major transport infrastructure networks (high-speed railways, aviation, and highways) and industrialization infrastructure. With the ambition to connect all 54 African states through transport infrastructure projects, this memorandum complements and aligns with Agenda 2063, which in turn aims to accelerate continental integration through the development of transport infrastructure and industrialization. Massive national and regional projects worth billions of dollars, mostly in the transport and [End Page 19] energy sectors, began to pop up across the continent. As of April 2019, China had BRI projects in 42 different African countries,4 and by January 2021 a total of 46 out of 54 African countries had signed on to become official...

Towards Road Sustainability—Part II: Applied Holistic Assessment and Lessons Learned from French Highway Resurfacing Strategies

Roads are major transportation infrastructure whose sustainability of maintenance practices has never been holistically assessed due to a lack of a proper method. This paper applies a newly developed assessment method (see article part I) on a 10-km-long section of French highway to fully compare the performance of various types of pavement resurfacing policies, for all the maintenance stakeholders, and considering pavement–vehicle interaction (PVI). After presenting the highway section and the parametrization of the model, four alternative resurfacing frequencies are compared to the French standard maintenance scenario over the pavement lifespan. Results show that increasing resurfacing frequency generates gains in terms of domestic production and employment, environmental damage (health, biodiversity, resources), user budgets, and local residents’ health damage created by traffic noise. Conversely, it entails financial losses for the road operator and government (tax revenues and net present value), as well as time losses for users. On the contrary, the consequences of a decrease in this frequency are the opposite. Excess fuel consumption due to PVI governs the scale of the environmental and financial gains or losses of highway maintenance policies. Optima in terms of health returns on investment and user savings appear to be around a 50% increase in maintenance funding: for each additional euro spent by the operator, there is a user gain of 3.5 euros and a human health gain of 710 euros. Sensitivity analyses indicate that the marginal gains are highly sensitive to the thickness of the resurfacing technique for macroeconomic indicators, global Net Present Value, and operator savings, while the gains are proportional to the traffic and International Roughness Indicator deterioration speed for tax revenue, users’ savings, time savings, noise, and environmental metrics. The other indicators are either slightly or not sensitive to these parameters. To conclude, the entire road maintenance system must be redesigned, from the tax system and funding schemes to the prioritization of road “green practices”, to align all the stakeholders’ interests towards a globally more sustainable road system.

Are several small wildlife crossing structures better than a single large? Arguments from the perspective of large wildlife conservation

Crossing structures for large wildlife are increasingly being constructed at major roads and railways in many countries and current guidelines for wildlife mitigation at linear infrastructures tend to advocate for large crossing structures sited at major movement corridors for the target species. The concept of movement corridors has, however, been challenged and pinching animal movements into bottlenecks entails risks. In this paper, I address the SLOSS dilemma of road ecology, i.e. the discussion whether a Single Large Or Several Small crossing structures along a linear barrier would produce the most benefit for wildlife, using the case of crossing structures for large wildlife in Sweden. I point out risks, ecological as well as practical, with investing in one large crossing structure and list a number of situations where it may be more beneficial to distribute the conservation efforts in the landscape by constructing several smaller crossing structures; for example, when the ecological knowledge is insufficient, when animal interactions are expected to be significant, when the landscape changes over time or when future human development cannot be controlled. I argue that such situations are often what infrastructure planning faces and that the default strategy, therefore, should be to distribute, rather than to concentrate passage opportunities along major transport infrastructures. I suggest that distributing passage opportunities over several smaller crossing structures would convey a risk diversification and that this strategy could facilitate the planning of wildlife mitigation. What to choose would however depend on, inter alia, landscape composition and ecology and on relationships amongst target species. A single large structure should be selected where it is likely that it can serve a large proportion of target animals and where the long-term functionality of the crossing structure can be guaranteed. New research is needed to support trade-offs between size and number of crossing structures. Cost-effectiveness analyses of wildlife crossing structures are currently rare and need to be further explored. Camera trapping and video surveillance of crossing structures provide opportunities to analyse details concerning, for example, any individual biases according to sex, age, status and grouping and any antagonism between species and individuals. Wildlife ecology research needs to better address questions posed by road and railway planning regarding the importance of specific movement routes and movement distances.

Coupling spatial modeling with expert opinion approaches to restore multispecies connectivity of major transportation infrastructure

It is widely recognized that major transportation infrastructures such as highways degrade habitats, increase the risk of collision mortality, and cause alterations in landscape connectivity by reducing connections between habitats due to the barrier effect. Wildlife crossings (underpasses and overpasses) have therefore become standard practice to reduce these effects on wildlife. Most studies aim to identify relevant locations for the creation of new wildlife crossings, but it is very rare for results based on modeling tools or animal movement records, for example, to be confronted with expert opinion and knowledge. Our paper provides a methodological framework combining modeling tools and field expertise from a multi-scale perspective. We used complementary connectivity metrics from graph theory to accurately quantify and spatialize the most relevant areas to improve habitat connectivity with multispecies conservation goals. The connectivity analysis was coupled with field expertise to take into account the local context, and technical and land feasibility. We prioritized existing road structures for improvement, found the best locations for new wildlife crossings, and made specific, costed technical recommendations. We empirically tested this approach on a large highway network in Northern France. This allowed us to define work principles to improve 109 existing road structures and to create underpasses or overpasses on 15 road sections. This innovative study for operational purposes has been a useful tool to assist the decision-making process of land-use planners who wish to improve wildlife crossings on major transportation infrastructures.

Becoming WestConnex – Becoming Sydney: Object-oriented politics, contested storylines and the multi-scalar imaginaries of building a motorway network in Sydney, Australia

Drawing on and developing literatures on automobilities, vertical urbanisms and the use of storylines to understand mega transport projects, we imagine infrastructure as a shifting assemblage of actors, storylines and material objects and practices. In the case of motorway building, this requires an understanding of how competing storylines about how both the infrastructure itself and the city it is located in are mobilised and politicised across diverse local geographies and multiple scales as the process proceeds. Our case study focuses on WestConnex, a 33 km motorway being built in Sydney, Australia. Similar to other major transport infrastructure projects, WestConnex morphed over time, growing in ambition, budget, complexity, debate and by enrolling new actors.

Geotechnical Investigation of karst sinkholes using an empirically-based CPT raveling chart

Sinkholes are a major geohazard damaging transportation infrastructure in karst areas where soluble carbonate bedrock exists. This paper presents a study on the resistance characteristics of soil prone to internal erosion and subsequent sinkhole formation through subsurface investigation and data processing. The Cone Penetration Test (CPT) enables the identification of soil deposits indicative to sinkhole activity and internal soil erosion. The output of this study is a CPT-based chart that identifies internally eroded soils referred as sinkhole raveling. The chart is divided into multiple zones that represents different potential progressions of raveling. For construction of the chart, a database of subsurface testing in karst sinkhole-active sites was created. A filtering scheme was employed to remove “noise” signals and statistical methods were used to define the dividing-criteria lines to create each zone of typical resistance values in the various soil raveling progressions encountered. Implementation of the CPT-based soil raveling identification chart allows sinkhole vulnerability assessment that better understand the subsurface soil behavior in karst areas and provides a standardized tool to identify depths at which the soil may be experiencing raveling.

Are green wall technologies suitable for major transport infrastructure construction projects?

Many city’s current transport infrastructure is deemed to be inadequate for rapid population growth and projected urbanisation, driving an increase in the construction of more efficient and reliable transport infrastructure and networks. However, transport infrastructure projects have negative impacts on the environment, during both the construction and operational phases. Green wall technologies have become an increasing trend within urban areas to combat these impacts, however, their uptake has been limited. This study answers the question of whether green wall technologies are a suitable technology for instilling sustainability into major infrastructure projects. This was achieved by comparing available green wall systems, conducting interviews with leading industry professionals and developing a case study on the possible areas of implementation of green wall technologies within a major multi-billion dollar infrastructure project. The overall benefits and constraints are presented, with insights into how these systems may contribute to sustainability rating tools for infrastructure projects.

The treatment of climate change impacts and adaptation in the environmental impact assessment of the standard Gauge railway project in Tanzania

ABSTRACT Transport remains one of the essential infrastructures, crucial for socio-economic development. However, climate change threatens the transport infrastructure development gains already achieved globally. The incorporation of climate change and adaptation capabilities into environmental impact assessment (EIA) processes has been extensively discussed and linked to enhanced project climate resilience. However, a considerable research gap remains unexplored, and that is assessing whether and how EIA has been used to climate-proof development proposals in Africa. This study examined how climate change impacts and adaptation capabilities featured in the EIA of a major transport infrastructure project in Tanzania. It draws on reviewing the project’s environmental impact statement (EIS) using review criteria derived from the literature. The findings revealed that all EIA stages addressed climate change in one way or another, with some of the criteria more comprehensively treated than others. A closer examination unveiled several good practices, which evidence appreciation for climate science and considerable strength in climate change preparedness. The results highlight EIA’s potential to steer climate efforts among vulnerable communities systematically. This paper will contribute to the international discussion on this issue and offer a basis for further research towards deeper engagement between the actors within EIA, transport planning and climate networks.

Where have all the backyards gone? The decline of usable residential greenspace in Brisbane, Australia

ABSTRACT Urban design impacts all aspects of our lives – economic, social and environmental. Government planning policies aim for clean, green, sustainable growth, encouraging residential development close to major infrastructure and parks; and advocate protection of greenspace to enhance livability, health and wellbeing. Using an inner-suburb of Brisbane as a case study, this research evaluated policy outcomes by analysing residential development applications, to identify gaps between the policy intent and implementation. The key measurable outcome criteria selected for this policy evaluation included: dwelling density; zone category, type and built-form totals; major shopping centres, transport infrastructure and parks proximity; tree removal and replacement totals; residential greenspace area totals and additional public greenspace provision. The methods are adaptable to policy evaluation locally, nationally and internationally. The research identified significant gaps between the intent and implementation of planning policies, finding residential development outcomes did not comply with the policy intent; and highlighted the importance of effective governance through policy evaluation. The findings indicated a critical need for legislative amendment to improve compliance and a need to differentiate between general and usable residential greenspaces (URG). Further research is required to determine URG dimensions that afford benefits, for incorporation into assessment benchmarks linked to policy initiatives.

Assessment of major Arctic development projects: new challenges — new responses

In recent years, several fundamental decisions were made in relation to the implementation of major transport infrastructure projects for the development of the Arctic. To ensure their justification and successful implementation, it is necessary to use adequate tools of project analysis. The paper addresses the development of methods for assessing the financial and economic efficiency of Arctic development projects and quantifying the results of interaction between project participants, including spatial interaction. The developed model allows us to quantify the redistribution of results between project participants due to the mechanisms of various government support instruments and methods of private financing. The proposed methods were tested for the Yamal LNG project.