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The Seoul Metropolitan Government (SMG) executed an innovative bus system reform in July 2004. The bus lines were reorganized as trunk, feeder, and circular routes; and bus numbers were arranged into eight areas. The monopolized route systems were reorganized as a semi-public operation, with a route tendering system to induce competition. A unified fare system was introduced taking into account transfers between buses; buses and the subway, and other modes of public transportation, all with the development of a new transportation card system. Exclusive median bus lanes were constructed in three major corridors. The main purposes of this paper are to (1) discuss the background and necessity of the bus system reform; (2) review the composition and functions of the Bus System Reform Citizen Committee (BSRCC), which instigated the reform; (3) analyze the role of BSRCC as a type of urban governance; and (4) provide policy implications. The study employs three techniques—literature reviews of the realities of bus service, in-depth interviews with stakeholders to analyze the roles and benefits of the BSRCC, and participant observation via a BSRCC member. All these help to shed light on a new form of urban governance which broke from the execution lead only by officials of the SMG.

The paper describes the formulation of the general planning model, TOPAZ (Technique for the Optimum Placement of Activities into Zones) and its application to evaluating and optimizing alternative growth patterns in urban systems. TOPAZ identifies an urban system as a set of interacting activities to be allocated to a set of zones to maximize an objective of overall benefit less cost of interaction between activities together with the benefit less cost of establishment of the activities, over a set of time periods. The model takes the form of a non-linear assignment problem with linear constraints, and is solved using iterative linear programming. The model is illustrated by application at a macro level to the evaluation of alternative corridor growth patterns for the city of Melbourne (population 2.4 million) over three time periods, 1970–80–90–2000. Two activities are involved, residential and employment activity, and the interactions consist of work, residential, industrial and commercial trips. The city is divided into forty zones.

A statistical model has been developed that relates changes in the highway network in Virginia to that in population, employment, income, substandard housing units, mortality rate, and educational levels in the various counties and cities in that State. Forecasts to 1980 then have been made using the model. Future levels of employment are shown to depend on (1) previous levels and (2) highway access to existing population and employment centers. Population is specified as a function of employment opportunities and labor force participation ratios. Income is seen as positively related to (1) the number of white collar workers and (2) the percent change in population in the particular locality. The mortality rate is anticipated to decline with increases in the latter factor. The quantity of housing units without plumbing is assumed to decrease, and the median school year completed to rise, with greater income. Changes in population and income thus are prime movers in altering some of these types of socio-economic impacts. The results from the application of the model using various sets of changes to the 1970 network indicate that: (a) Significant changes can be wrought in rural areas close to major population concentrations in the eastern part of Virginia. (b) The overall statewide effects are fairly minimal.

The zero integer is one of the great arithmetic trouble-makers in the elementary school., In recognition of this difficulty, modern professionalized arithmetic recommends that operations involving zero be taught after the operations involving the other integers have been presented.2 The writer's experience with teachers in service and with students in training reveals a lack of confidence when operating with the zero, particularly in division. Both teachers in service and students in training explain that they have memorized rules which govern the operation of the zero, and they also contend that such irrational rules are unfortunate.

The author, chairman of the Urban and Regional Planning Programme at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in the USA, has been concerned with the relationship between transportation ...

A TECHNIQUE IS PRESENTED WHICH COMBINES SIMULATION AND SEARCH PROCEDURES. THE PARTICULAR SITUATION USED FOR AN EXAMPLE CONCERNS DELAYS TO LEFT TURNING AND OPPOSING TRAFFIC AT AN ISOLATED INTERSECTION WHERE THE LEFT TURN GREEN (LTG) AND FULL GREEN (FG) PHASES OF A PRETIMED TRAFFIC SIGNAL CAN BE SET TO ANY DESIRED VALUE. A TIME- ORIENTED SIMULATION IS MADE OF THE ARRIVALS, PROCESSING AND DELAY OF VEHICLES AT THE INTERSECTION FOR ONE LEVEL OF HOURLY ARRIVAL VOLUMES AND FOR ONE SETTING OF THE LTG AND FG PHASE. THEREAFTER, NEW SETTINGS ARE DERIVED BASED ON THE MEASURED DELAYS. THIS PROCESS CONTINUES UNTIL OPTIMUM SETTINGS HAVE BEEN ESTABLISHED. THE SEARCH PROCEDURE UTILIZED IS MULTIDIMENSIONAL AND STOCHASTIC IN NATURE AND RECOGNIZES A LEVEL OF RESOLUTION WITHIN WHICH NO MEASUREABLE DIFFERENCES IN A CONTROL VARIABLE CAN BE DETECTED. THE PROCEDURE ALSO TAKES ADVANTAGE OF ANY PRIOR KNOWLEDGE ON THE PART OF THE USER IN ORDER TO ESTABLISH A STARTING POINT. RESULTS INDICATED THAT MINIMUM DELAY SETTINGS CAN BE FOUND RATHER QUICKLY WITH THE TECHNIQUE EVEN IF THE STARTING POINT IS POORLY SITUATED. /AUTHOR/

The record of useful application of models in urban and regional planning does not look very impressive if judged from recent literature. The rather spectacular failures of some large scale urban models are featured in review articles and some harsh statements have been made: They are established without a single successful demonstration, they are tried everywhere and they do not work anywhere. They require theory that no one has and data no one can get. All claim to enhance societal learning, but none contain operative mechanisms for benefiting from their own mistakes (13.1).

The program described in this paper has been initiated through support provided partially by the U.S. Department of Transportation under its Program of University Research in response to a proposal submitted jointly by Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University and the University of Virginia with the endorsement of various state agencies and of the Secretary for Transportation and Public Safety. The objective of the program is to bring together the talents and interests widely scattered throughout the academic institutions of the state and provide a mechanism for interaction with state officials and agencies directly concerned with transportation and with other problems related to transportation. A Steering Committee has been formed to serve as a focal point for this activity. Membership includes representatives from the state government, including the Secretary for Transportation and Public Safety, from local and regional groups within the state, and from the academic institutions. The ultimate goal for this Committee is to develop a well-coordinated program of research, study, and demonstrations utilizing the talents and facilities in the state to assure that the state's problems are being explored from the broadest possible viewpoint and that Virginia is keeping abreast of the rapidly changing picture in all fields of transportation.

Aside from their educational value, models are supposed to be beneficial to the decision-making process. There are, as we well know, many reasons why this cannot be so. Both technical and political decision-makers often are guided by factors other than those embodied in the model. These might include, for instance, past decisions made by these people or agreements made to trade votes in exchange for each other’s favourite projects. Under these circumstances there is relatively little contribution that a model can make to influence the “proper” decision.

In 1970, the first application of TOPAZ for the future growth of the city of Melbourne, Australia, was initiated under the sponsorship of the Melbourne Metropolitan Board of Works (MMBW), the authority responsible for the planning of future development of the city. Melbourne’s population in 1970 was 2.4 million and this was expected to rise to 5.0 million* by the year 2000.

The preceding chapter highlighted a variety of sensitivity studies that can be carried out using TOPAZ. This chapter centers on more in-depth investigations of the impact of constraining growth to selected corridors in the Melbourne area. In 1971 the Melbourne and Metropolitan Board of Works (MMBW), the authority responsible for planning the future development of the city, produced a report (3.1) recommending that any outward extension of the city be contained within eight growth corridors radiating from the fringe of the existing development.

The preceding chapters describe the development of TOPAZ as a second generation urban model and its use at various planning levels. Its further development as a third generation model with enhanced capabilities for forecasting and explanation, as well as planning and evaluation, is now described.

An endeavor similar to the one in Melbourne was carried out for Blacksburg, Virginia, a small, but expanding town with a population of 24,000 in 1976 (including students at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University residing off-campus). This effort was intended as a prototype, but actually has proven to have some interesting practical ramifications since at the time of the study Blacksburg was involved in a court case in which a part of the adjacent county was annexed.*

A series of further investigations employing TOPAZ have been carried out in Melbourne, primarily as extensions of the growth corridor studies reported in the preceding chapter. Five of these have been selected for further elaboration here. One is concerned with the impacts on costs of different horizon year population levels. The second looks at the costs accruing from long term versus short term planning. The third focuses on accessibility to residents and to employment by both private (auto) and public transportation. The fourth study is a hypothetical one dealing with the spacing and distances from the central city of new urban centers. The final study investigates the effects of alternative transport policies and pricing strategies. While these studies are not integrated, they do display a variety of common concerns about the timed growth of Melbourne.

Lack of proper management of resources is one of the major problems facing the world in this decade, and possibly in the distant future. Fossil fuels and other mineral deposits which have taken millions of years to accumulate are facing exhaustion in time periods now under present planning consideration. The impact of these conditions on the planning of facilities must be taken into account if they are not to be rendered obsolete before they even come into existence. Transport systems, urban development, and building complexes all face critical appraisal or reappraisal in this light.

TOPAZ can be applied to a variety of water-related problems in addition to those concerned with the costs of urban and regional level services. As an example, in fitting with the larger geographical context in the preceding chapter, it would be possible to use TOPAZ for helping to plan an overall regional water system, including the location of water storage spaces, power plants, and irrigation areas, and the selection of the capacities and times of development of each (9.1 and 9.2) .

In the initial application in both Melbourne and Blacksburg only fairly simple estimates of costs were employed. In the case of Blacksburg, for example, the estimates for water and sewer services were obtained from town officials and developers and varied primarily with slope, depth to bedrock, and nearness to existing facilities. Obviously significant factors like the capacities of pipes and treatment plants and lowered unit costs with greater quantities of service (that is, economies of scale) had to be ignored. In this chapter refinements made to several of the initial “models” are presented and discussed. Comparisons then are made of the TOPAZ-generated results obtained with and without the revised models.