Urban Systems最新文献

The application of computer assisted policy capturing to an ill-structured problem environment is presented. The development of a project proposal evaluation model for use by Comprehensive Employment and Training Act Prime Sponsors in the distribution of Title VI Emergency Jobs Act monies is discussed, stressing the necessity for active involvement by all affected parties. The use of this model to aid in the distribution of over $15 million in grant monies is then discussed. This process may be generalized to decision-making in both public and private agencies.

This paper models a class of capital budgeting problems in pavement maintenance as nonlinear discontinuous programming problems and presents a solution procedure. The objective of the models developed is to determine if certain road segments should be rehabilitated in the given year (resurfaced, reconstructed or patched), or major maintenance postponed for at least another year. If the road is to be rehabilitated, some variation in funds expended is possible. The marginal return within the allowable interval of variation is estimated to be nonlinear. Two basic models are presented. The first assumes the rehabilitative alternative or design is fixed, and hence the problem has a single linear constraint imposed by the budget. The second is the design selection problem and contains multiple choice constraints in addition to the budget constraint. An illustrative example is included.

This paper introduces a WATFIV computer program for constructing cause-eliminated life tables. This program, which is readily adaptable to particular causes of death and populations of interest, calculates and prints both the life table including all causes of death and the life table with specific causes of death eliminated and it allows the user to employ as many causes or groups of causes as desired.

Contemporary problems in resource and environmental management often cut across disciplinary and other man-made boundaries. Recently several governmental, educational, and research institutions have come up with a variety of organizational plans to address environmental problems that are interdisciplinary in nature. Within the scope of many of these plans, systems analysis has been considered a potential framework in which varied disciplinary efforts can be integrated and unified. This paper discusses the scope and limitation of systems analysis as such an integrative tool. In particular, the roles of objectives, orchestration, synthesis, and implementation in the solution of resource and environmental problems are discussed in detail. Finally, an integrated curriculum for ecosystems management and a set of recommendations to improve the organizational efficiency and the design of interdisciplinary research efforts are also provided.

The problems of crime and the fear of crime in American cities constitute a major component of the ‘urban crisis’. The first objective of this research was to determine the extent to which several demographic and socioeconomic factors influenced both operating and capital police expenditures in the 383 largest cities. Before the impact of these potentially policy-relevant variables on spending could be measured, the effects of urban size had to be mathematically removed from actual police expenditures by means of a regression technique. This analysis revealed that urbanism, in addition to urban size, was an important determinant of police operating expenditures. When residual, size-free expenditures were broken down by political attributes of cities, ‘reformed cities’ (those possessing a city manager form of government, nonpartisan elections, councilmen elected at-large and the mayor elected from the council) were found to spend less for police protection, given their sizes. It also became clear that this economy was achieved at the expense of the capital (including equipment) budgets. If this economy was achieved without sacrificing the quality of police services, perhaps governmental variables, as well as ‘need’ variables, ought to be considered by agencies giving financial assistance to cities.

The use of Zero Base Budgeting (ZBB) in the public sector has increased significantly since the early 1970's. Recent surveys have indicated that the federal government, twelve state governments and several municipalities are either in the process of implementing a ZBB System or have one in effect. The primary purpose of this paper is to determine (1) the extent to which ZBB is being used in cities, (2) the procedures and practices being employed in user cities, and (3) the problems and benefits of ZBB as a management tool in local governments. This information, collected from a mail questionnaire, provides insight into how effectively ZBB works in the public sector, in general: and, in cities, in particular.