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Slower speed limits and regulated passing distances between motor vehicles and bicycles are now taken-for-granted in policies aimed at increasing cycling participation rates by addressing safety concerns in societies dominated by cars. Rather than understanding distance as a measurement between two points, this paper addresses the sensibilities of proximity. This paper draws on the work of Deleuze and Guattari and the related concepts of assemblage, territory and critical distance, to better understand how subjectivities emerge through sensations of proximity-in-motion while riding a bike. Attention turns to how experiences of risk underpin an encroachment on personal space that transforms the affective capacities of cycling bodies to ride specific routes along roads, footpaths and cycleways. The article engages with the situated cycling experiences of 28 individuals who ride for leisure and/or transport, who consented to participate in a cycling sensory ethnography in the small city of Wollongong, Australia. Greater appreciation of how sensations of antagonism triggered by proximity-in-cycling-motion, work to reinforce or challenge subjectivities may offer insights to improve actual and perceived safety for cyclists beyond fixed distance policy concepts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Blockage of cross-drainage hydraulic structures (e.g., bridges, culverts) is reported as an exacerbating factor during flash flooding in Wollongong and Newcastle. Lack of data from flooding events and the fragmentary nature of post-flood data are the factors hindering research in studying the impact of blockage on the performance of hydraulic structures. This paper proposes lab-scale simulations using scaled physical models of culverts to study the behaviour and effects of urban and vegetative debris. The first investigation studies the interaction between specific debris types with culvert inlet geometries and their impact on the hydraulic blockage. In the second investigation, a flood hydrograph is simulated in the laboratory to study complex relationships between blockage-related influential factors and to relate the observed visual blockage and hydraulic blockage. From the results of first investigation, urban debris was reported the main contributor in increasing the hydraulic blockage at structures. Furthermore, the degree of hydraulic blockage was found sensitive to the orientation of the debris. Results from the second investigation reported several insights regarding the complex relationships between blockage-related influential factors. The temporally variable nature of blockage was observed from the experiments that suggested revising the existing constant blockage based Australian Rainfall and Runoff (ARR) guidelines. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Social & Cultural Geography is the property of Routledge and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

On August 4, 2009, Australian online news commentary website thePunchannounced that Albion Park, in the Australian industrial city of Wollongong, was one of the nation's top ten “most bogan” places. This paper explores what it means to beboganin Australia, tracing historical antecedents, local debate at the time of this media event, and the manner in which the politics of class and place identity are negotiated through humour. Some local residents railed against associations with “lower-class” culture or feared damaged reputations for their neighbourhoods; others responded in sometimes unexpected and creative ways—through humour, and by claimingboganas an alternative source of legitimacy for working-class identity. I reflect on this case for how humour operates ambiguously in an age of email, blogs, and social media technologies—building on previous norms of media dialogue and on established understandings of class polarisation in Australian cities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a framework for analysing which households are doing ‘their bit’ for sustainability in an era of climate change, using a two-stage cluster analysis of sustainable household capabilities. The framework segments households by their reported level of commitment to ‘pro-sustainability’ practices common to conventional government policies. Results are presented from a large-scale survey of Wollongong households, New South Wales, Australia. Results illustrate the importance of approaching household sustainability through everyday practices. Attention is drawn to the wide variation in participation in specific household sustainability practices. Investigation into sustainable household capability by household segments shows the limits of even the most committed households. Results show the importance of socio-cultural contexts in differentiating sustainable household capabilities—with women, suburban-detached households and lower income segments of the population ultimately doing most of the work of being sustainable. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

While links between social and physical disorder, crime, and the fear of crime have long been areas of research interest, few studies have looked at these links from a spatiotemporal viewpoint. This is somewhat surprising, as many of the factors associated with disorder, crime, and fear are known to vary over time and space. This paper uses GISystems to investigate potential spatiotemporal links between these areas in Wollongong, New South Wales, with specific focus on links between graffiti and the fear of crime. The results reveal that the distribution of fear of crime varies considerably over time and is often spatially coincident with concentrations of disorder. Graffiti was found to be one of the most prevalent types of physical disorder. The results are discussed in the context of the“broken windows” thesis and strategic intervention at the community level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Social & Cultural Geography is the property of Routledge and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

As part of the revision of Australian Rainfall and Runoff, Working Party 11 - Debris Blockage of Waterways is determining how flood-mobilised debris might best be accounted for in the design of the waterway openings of hydraulic structures. The claim of much data on debris blockage of drainage structures in the 1998 Wollongong flooding has been examined, and the finding is that none of that event's data quantifies the degree of hydraulic blockage of waterways by debris. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since 2006, Research Online, the University of Wollongong's open access institutional repository has utilised Bepress' Digital Commons software to make available published research outputs and digital theses. This article discusses the outcomes of recent academic demand for its use as a publishing tool of university journals and conference proceedings. The Journal of University Teaching and Learning Practice is provided as an example. Digital Commons includes the editorial management software, EdiKit, which assists in managing submissions, editorial functions, and peer review. Also considered are changes to scholarly communication patterns arising out of the new open access, electronic only, publication regimes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explains how pre-service teachers used a reflective framework to study the relationship between teaching and learning in a 13-week science method course. The course was in the second year of a three-year Bachelor of Teaching (Primary) degree at the University of Wollongong, Australia. The students had a three-hour class each week made up of a one-hour lecture followed by two hours of hands-on activities. After each class the students had to reflect on their experiences to study the relationship between teaching and their learning. There were three phases which guided students in using a reflective journal: (i) analysis of their class experiences to identify influences on their learning according to four categories-personal, teaching, peer and situational; (ii) synthesis of their reflections in which the students collated and identified key factors for each of the four categories; and (iii) theorising to identify a metaphor as a representation of a relationship between teaching and learning. The metaphor represented an optimal learning environment in a university class and was labelled with key personal, social (teaching and peer) and situational factors identified in their reflections. Students were then requested to deduce implications for their future role as classroom teachers. All students were able to reflect on teaching and learning, but two issues need to be considered before students uses the framework. First, reflecting upon how they learn was a new experience for the pre-service teachers and the framework needs to be modelled to them at the beginning of a course. Second, there are ethical issues that need to be discussed with students when they are expected to constructively analyse teaching and learning. Although the pre-service students claimed that using the framework was the hardest task they had attempted at university, they gained insights into how they learned which had implications for how they planned to teach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An important task of mobility scholars is to attend to how time and space are generated through mobilities. Building upon research inspired by Deleuze and Guattari that foregrounds experiential mobilities, we use the notion of the refrain to chart experiences of long-distance rail commuting with a particular focus on how these journeys are crafted to be productive. Moreover, we consider a series of interruptions and their transformative potential. We read wanted and unwanted interruptions as breaks in the consistency of a refrain – disruptions to the socio-material, affective, and expressive arrangements that constitute a sense of productivity. We submit that in the wake of interruption, a refrain may dissolve or reform in three different ways: as repeat, as variation, or as developing variation. These categorisations help us to understand the differential influence of interruption on a refrain. We illustrate our argument by drawing on ethnographic research conducted with 16 mobile commuters who regularly journey by train for work between Wollongong and Sydney (Australia) – a trip of at least 90 minutes each way along a key commuting corridor. Through building an account of long-distance commuting, this article provides insights into how productivity (and productive subjects) may manifest through mundane activities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses Wollongong floods and its reasons. It states that data collected during and after the 1998 flood in Wollongong is of no value in assessing the impact of structure blockages. It mentions that it is clear that substantial amounts of debris can be mobilized and build up at structures during flooding. Depending on the blockage mechanism triggered observations and analysis have shown that flood behavior in the vicinity can be altered by blockage of that structure.

A complex relationship exists between music scenes and the infrastructure in which they are located. This article focuses on the rise and fall of the Oxford Tavern, a live music venue in the Australian city of Wollongong. Pivotal in this venue was the role that booking agents played in developing what they perceived as an inclusive, self-sufficient and vibrant music scene—by generating and then consistently implementing a strict philosophy on what music and which bands performed there. Bookings were not based on reputation, and potentially better known or more lucrative bands were regularly denied access in favour of ‘local’ bands socially connected to the music scene. These bands were authenticated as ‘local’ because of social and geographical proximity—not because of any innate musicological distinctiveness connected to Wollongong. This social geographical emphasis on ‘local’ and ‘original’ music transcended musical genre and subcultural style. Although in one sense ‘exclusionary’, gatekeeping also fostered bonds of community and belonging, creating a perceived haven for diverse local cultures within a monopolised urban nightscape. Such gatekeeping practices—explored here through interviews with booking agents and music scene participants—were pivotal to the longevity of the music venue and scene. Only when booking agents with a strong ‘local’ ethos were removed from the venue did it struggle to survive, and ultimately collapse. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Pre-stressed concrete sleepers are the main components of railway track systems. To carry and transfer the dynamic wheel loads from the rails to the ground, their current design and construction are limited by allowable flexural stress constraints under service conditions. In current design practice for such a component, the dynamic load effects due to wheel/rail interactions are treated as a quasi-static load using a dynamic impact factor. Then, the allowable stresses eliminate a crack initiation. In reality, the impact events are frequently recorded because of the uncertainties of wheel or rail irregularities such as flat wheels and dipped rails. These effects cause cracking in the concrete sleepers, resulting in excessive maintenance. Limit states design philosophy for the pre-stressed concrete sleepers, containing ultimate and fatigue limit states, has been recently proposed based on structural reliability concept to rationalise the design method and minimise the maintenance. On the basis of probabilistic approach, the high-magnitude low-cycle fatigue limit states, which are more significant in terms of damage evolution, have been addressed in this article. Series of repeated impact tests for the in-situ pre-stressed concrete sleepers were carried out using the Australian largest high-capacity drop weight impact testing machine at the University of Wollongong. The impact forces have been simulated in relation to the probabilistic track force distribution obtained from a heavy haul rail network. This article focuses on the impact responses of the cumulatively damaged sleepers. The effects on such responses of the track environments including soft and hard track supports are also highlighted in this article. It is found that a concrete sleeper damaged by the impact fatigue cycles could possess significant reserve capacity for resisting the axle load in a similar manner as the undamaged sleeper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A Buddhist temple in Berkeley, Wollongong, may at first appear puzzling given that few Buddhists lived there. Indeed, the suburb was home to predominantly those Anglo-Celtic Australians most marginalised by the structural changes to the city's economic base. This problem is explored within the social dynamics of inclusion and exclusion operating within the local politics of place-making. Drawing upon the concept of a progressive sense to place revealed that discourses of support for the temple drew heavily on imagining Australia and Wollongong as multicultural and the temple as an exotic object of the Orient, worthy of tourist visitation. A Buddhist temple provided the city with a source of cultural vitality and enrichment. Imagined as a tourist attraction, a place to visit, rather than as sacred space, a place to worship, a Buddhism sect was perhaps in this way made less threatening to local Christian residents. These results further support arguments that suggest a redundancy to the fixed notions of place as bounded territory and how territorial rules that define whether something, or someone, is appropriately placed requires interrogating the connectedness between social powers and the powers of place. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]