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Provision of fair, affordable and accessible transport is an essential objective of Smart Cities. In previous research, we outlined five action areas to enhance Last Mile Mobility for older adults and persons with disabilities. Following up, we expand our view towards a wider Smart City context, reflecting on needs of other target audiences of urban and suburban transport systems. By analyzing the effects of an enhanced Last Mile Mobility on children, adolescents and marginalized persons, we conclude to review the transport ecosystem as a whole. Based on this holistic view, we elaborate further on previously identified action areas, focusing first on the three action areas, which describe a transport system’s service quality: spread of service areas, accessibility of provided services, and availability of demand-driven services. We continue to deepen our view on the potential role of paratransit services within the urban transport ecosystem (action area 4), and finally delve into policy needs and recommendations to maximize Last Mile mobility in Smart Cities (action area 5). We conclude our work with a suggestion for future pilot implementation based on our findings.

Technological developments in the last 20 years have been instrumental in service provision by offering new means of interaction among stakeholders in virtual environments. However, in most service sectors, the consumer journey is growing in complexity, which calls for a multifaceted service logic. While a number of ICT companies have been expanding their portfolio from an entirely virtual to additional physical experience, a seamless merger of both physical and virtual worlds in service provision may still be some way off. This applies to advisory services for Ambient Assisted Living (AAL) solutions, a recently opened market of great importance in the contemporary ageing society. In this position paper, we expand on the concepts of engagement platforms and engagement ecosystems to argue that an integration of physical and virtual worlds is necessary for AAL advisory services. We first determine the extent to which current service platforms are acting as ‘engagement platforms’ by presenting key insights from an analysis of platforms and services promoting AAL products for older adults. The focus lays on the stakeholder involvement, the interaction and feedback features. Second, we identify the key features that a platform must have to qualify as an engagement platform. Third, the debate delves deeper on how to integrate both virtual and physical dimensions in an optimal solution for stakeholders’ engagement. Finally, we present the concept of an ‘Authorized Active Advisor’ as a solution of utmost relevance in this field due to preferences evidenced by older age groups and to insufficiencies exposed in most service platforms, such as lack of personalization and interaction features.

For the last 10 years, ageing well in the community has become a key concern of the European Union and its member states. Action plans as well as distinct programs such as the Ambient Assisted Living (AAL) Joint Programme are evidence of this engagement. Since then, many AAL products and services have been developed and implemented in the European market. Up to now, however, access to, and the availability of these solutions is difficult, and the information on their use is scarce. ActiveAdvice, an AAL EU-funded project aims to develop an online platform which offers both information on AAL solutions as well as advice to end users. This paper discusses the application of a multi-stakeholder perspective approach. It discusses the user-centered development and reflects on the establishment of AAL ecosystems and the functional requirements of the ActiveAdvice platform. It includes an extended methodological framework, which explains conclusively the ActiveAdvice stakeholders’ identification process and the user-centered requirements analysis, built on 38 semi-structured interviews with three stakeholder groups – consumers, businesses and governments. The integration of different stakeholders in the development and implementation of AAL solutions is a necessity as well as a challenge. This holds also true for the development of the ActiveAdvice platform.

The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of a shared mental model (SMM) based intervention on student team mental model similarity and ultimately team performance in an undergraduate meteorology course. The team knowledge sharing (TKS) intervention was designed to promote team reflection, communication, and improvement planning. Results reveal that the TKS intervention was partially effective in enhancing student team SMM and team scores on meteorology lab assignments. The TKS intervention has potential for use in science courses where a teaming approach is used. Similar interventions could likely be developed, empirically examined, and potentially employed to promote success in handling complex challenges while working in teams in the classroom and beyond.

For decades, photovoltaic (PV) modules have been manufactured and tested under conditions that are not globally representative. With the emergence of renewable energy as a viable alternative to fossil fuel, a greater level of scrutiny is being targeted towards standards by which this renewable energy generation is being attended. Standard test conditions (STC) along with the established mid-latitude-based reference spectra are among the standards used to rate PV modules internationally. However, with the global impact that renewable energy technology is currently having and will continue to have in the future, such a new system that accounts for low-latitude regions of the world is imperative; and it has been proposed through this research paper. The model capitalizes on the gains of the current standards used, in order to account for the differences in the combination of spectral distribution, module temperature, solar irradiance and meteorological conditions that are representative of lower latitude regions. Equally important, the development of regional spectra is expected to increase the level of interest and investments in this technology, yielding an economy of scale reduction in the cost of solar PV systems in the region. This work centers on the need to develop a system of regional standardization using the Caribbean and Latin America as a test case. New reference spectra are proposed with the advantage of more relevant solar ratings for the region. The methodology employed in this research paper is also being proposed as a generic tool for other regions exploring regional standardization.

Usability and accessibility are key success factors for systems, which are developed for the Active and Assisted Living (AAL) target group. In order to maximise the uptake of the software solution implemented in the iCareCoops project, a broad study of usability and accessibility was conducted. A literature review revealed significant shortcomings in concrete implementation guidance across current publications and usability standardisation (WCAG, ISO). The subsequent low-fidelity prototype tests aimed at resolving the knowledge gap through extensive feedback from representative end-user groups. Paper prototypes of the user interface based on literature insights and early concepts allowed for a hands-on experience for participants. Thus, the test resulted in very specific instructions and recommendations for the user interface (UI) implementation. Due to the lack of literature on the practical implementation and the fruitful outcome of the iCareCoops process, we propose a best practice approach for future AAL solution development employing a mix of quantitative questionnaires, qualitative, semi-structured interviews, thinking aloud tests, and goal-driven evaluation with clear usability criteria, measurements and pass-fail indicators.

This report summarizes discussions that took place during a Unidata Cooperative Program for Operational Meteorology, Education, and Training (COMET) workshop on Mesoscale Meteorology Instruction in the Age of the Modernized Weather Service. The workshop was held 13–17 June 1994 in Boulder, Colorado, and it was organized by the Unidata Users Committee, with help from Unidata, COMET, and the National Center for Atmospheric Research staff. The principal objective of the workshop was to assess the need for and to initiate those changes at universities that will be required if students are to learn mesoscale and synoptic meteorology more effectively in this era of rapid technological advances. Seventy-one participants took part in the workshop, which included invited lectures, breakout roundtable discussions on focused topics, electronic poster sessions, and a forum for discussing recommendations and findings in a plenary session. Leading scientists and university faculty in the area of synoptic and m...

In 1992 a precollege outreach program designed to bring weather satellite imagery into the classroom was developed jointly by the Florida Technological Research and Development Authority and The Florida State University Department of Meteorology. This initiative incorporates the NOAA Direct Readout Satellite-data ingest program into Florida public school districts for the enhancement of education in a variety of curriculum areas.

This study examines the structure of horizontal modes (meandering, vortical modes or fossil turbulence) in a layer of intermittent turbulence occurring at the top of a strongly stratified nocturnal inversion layer as observed by fast response aircraft data. The spatial variation of the coefficients of the principal components identify regular coherent structures with mainly horizontal motions. Conditional sampling is formulated in terms of this spatial variation. The quasi-horizontal motions are characterized by relatively sharp edges (transition zones) where horizontal convergence or divergence, small-scale turbulence and vertical fluxes seem to be concentrated. Zones of horizontal divergence appear to be associated with ejection of cold air from the underlying surface inversion while the convergent zones might be due to random “collisions” between horizontal modes.