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Tsunami Preparedness And Resilience: Evacuation Logistics And Time Estimations

Chen, Chen; Wang, Haizhong; Lindell, Michael K.; Jung, Meen Chel; Siam, M. R. K. (2022). Tsunami Preparedness And Resilience: Evacuation Logistics And Time Estimations. Transportation Research Part D-transport And Environment, 109.

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Abstract

Extensive research has studied the near-field tsunami threat in the Cascadia Subduction Zone (CSZ), but little research has examined the ability to evacuate the inundation zone before the first tsunami wave arrives. To address this gap, this study provides empirical evidence about people's expectations about hazard onset and evacuation logistics when a tsunami threatens. We surveyed households in five CSZ communities to assess residents' expected first wave arrival time, as well as their expectations about evacuation destinations, route choices, preparation times, travel times, and clearance times. Heatmaps are used to summarize residents' evacuation destinations and route choices, and probabilistic functions are used to model evacuation distances and time estimates. The results suggest that respondents have similar patterns of time estimates, but a few plan to evacuate within the inundation zone, and some plan to evacuate on routes that were congested in a previous event and end their evacuations at destinations within the inundation zone.

Keywords

Disaster; Tsunami Evacuation; Time Estimate; Cascadia Subduction Zone; Behavior; Decision-making; American-samoa; Earthquake; Oregon; Washington; Wellington; Responses; Hazard; Model

A Neighborhood Wealth Metric for Use in Health Studies

Moudon, Anne Vernez; Cook, Andrea J.; Ulmer, Jared; Hurvitz, Philip M.; Drewnowski, Adam. (2011). A Neighborhood Wealth Metric for Use in Health Studies. American Journal Of Preventive Medicine, 41(1), 88 – 97.

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Abstract

Background: Measures of neighborhood deprivation used in health research are typically based on conventional area-based SES. Purpose: The aim of this study is to examine new data and measures of SES for use in health research. Specifically, assessed property values are introduced as a new individual-level metric of wealth and tested for their ability to substitute for conventional area-based SES as measures of neighborhood deprivation. Methods: The analysis was conducted in 2010 using data from 1922 participants in the 2008-2009 survey of the Seattle Obesity Study (SOS). It compared the relative strength of the association between the individual-level neighborhood wealth metric (assessed property values) and area-level SES measures (including education, income, and percentage above poverty as single variables, and as the composite Singh index) on the binary outcome fair/poor general health status. Analyses were adjusted for gender, categoric age, race, employment status, home ownership, and household income. Results: The neighborhood wealth measure was more predictive of fair/poor health status than area-level SES measures, calculated either as single variables or as indices (lower DIC measures for all models). The odds of having a fair/poor health status decreased by 0.85 (95% CI=0.77, 0.93) per $50,000 increase in neighborhood property values after adjusting for individual-level SES measures. Conclusions: The proposed individual-level metric of neighborhood wealth, if replicated in other areas, could replace area-based SES measures, thus simplifying analyses of contextual effects on health. (Am J Prev Med 2011; 41(1): 88-97) (C) 2011 American Journal of Preventive Medicine

Keywords

Health -- Social Aspects; Social Status; Public Health Research; Home Ownership; Income; Real Property; Deprivation (psychology); Health Education; Disparities Geocoding Project; Body-mass Index; Socioeconomic-status; Ecological Fallacy; Built Environment; Deprivation Indexes; Multilevel Analysis; Individual-level; Social-class; Inequalities

When To Partner For Public Infrastructure?

Whittington, Jan. (2012). When to Partner for Public Infrastructure? Journal Of The American Planning Association, 78(3), 269 – 285.

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Abstract

Problem, research strategy, and findings: Public agencies traditionally request bids and award contracts to private firms after infrastructure designs are complete (bid-build). They also increasingly partner with private firms, often by folding capital improvements into a contract to design and build (design-build). The latter involves much more than the mere transfer of design work to the private sector, such as time to completion; the merits or problems of design-build strategies can, thus, be difficult to isolate. This article presents a method for doing so. Together with the development of a theory of contracting, the comparative analysis of two very similar highway overpass projects, one design-build and the other bid-build, demonstrates how so-called transaction cost economics can clarify the details of partnership cost-effectiveness. Takeaway for practice: Transaction cost analysis disaggregates and evaluates the costs of completed projects, accounting for factors typically external to economic analysis. My approach reveals tradeoffs between variables of interest to planners, such as the pace of delivery, public participation, environmental compliance, and the transfer of risk of cost overrun to the private sector.

Keywords

Design & Build Contracts; Bridges; Infrastructure (economics); Transaction Costs; Construction Contracts; Public-private Sector Cooperation; Transportation Planning; Design-build; Evaluation; Infrastructure; Public–private Partnership; Transaction Cost; Vertical Integration; Contracting Process; Privatization; Firm; Services; Reverse; Lie; Public-private Partnership

Food Environment and Socioeconomic Status Influence Obesity Rates in Seattle and in Paris

Drewnowski, A.; Moudon, A. V.; Jiao, J.; Aggarwal, A.; Charreire, H.; Chaix, B. (2014). Food Environment and Socioeconomic Status Influence Obesity Rates in Seattle and in Paris. International Journal Of Obesity, 38(2), 306 – 314.

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Abstract

OBJECTIVE: To compare the associations between food environment at the individual level, socioeconomic status (SES) and obesity rates in two cities: Seattle and Paris. METHODS: Analyses of the SOS (Seattle Obesity Study) were based on a representative sample of 1340 adults in metropolitan Seattle and King County. The RECORD (Residential Environment and Coronary Heart Disease) cohort analyses were based on 7131 adults in central Paris and suburbs. Data on sociodemographics, health and weight were obtained from a telephone survey (SOS) and from in-person interviews (RECORD). Both studies collected data on and geocoded home addresses and food shopping locations. Both studies calculated GIS (Geographic Information System) network distances between home and the supermarket that study respondents listed as their primary food source. Supermarkets were further stratified into three categories by price. Modified Poisson regression models were used to test the associations among food environment variables, SES and obesity. RESULTS: Physical distance to supermarkets was unrelated to obesity risk. By contrast, lower education and incomes, lower surrounding property values and shopping at lower-cost stores were consistently associated with higher obesity risk. CONCLUSION: Lower SES was linked to higher obesity risk in both Paris and Seattle, despite differences in urban form, the food environments and in the respective systems of health care. Cross-country comparisons can provide new insights into the social determinants of weight and health.

Keywords

Obesity; Health & Social Status; Social Status; Supermarkets; Grocery Shopping; Physiology; Body-mass Index; Dietary Energy Density; Atherosclerosis Risk; Weight Status; Us Adults; Associations; Health; French; Access; Socioeconomic Status (ses); Access To Supermarket; Food Environment; Food Shopping

Chandigarh: City and Periphery.

Chalana, Manish. (2015). Chandigarh: City and Periphery. Journal Of Planning History, 14(1), 62 – 84.

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Abstract

This article traces the history of the greenbelt of Chandigarh, India's first modernist city, designed by Le Corbusier. The zone's protection was mandated by the Periphery Control Act of 1952, although the act's contents are often misinterpreted and do not fully reflect the project team's complex vision. This work clarifies the intentions behind the Periphery's creation, and establishes its integration with the master plan. I demonstrate how ongoing transformations violate the spirit of the Periphery's original purpose, but rarely the letter of the law. I highlight ongoing conflicts whose resolution will fundamentally shape the future of the Periphery and the master plan of Chandigarh.

Keywords

Greenbelts; Urban Planning; Urban Cores; Landscape Protection; Architecture; Government Policy; Twentieth Century; History Of India, 1947-; Chandigarh (india); India; Chandigarh; Greenbelt; Le Corbusier; Modernism; Periphery; Le Corbusier, 1887-1965

Comparisons of Physical Activity and Walking between Korean Immigrant and White Women in King County, WA

Baek, So-Ra; Moudon, Anne Vernez; Saelens, Brian E.; Kang, Bumjoon; Hurvitz, Philip M.; Bae, Chang-hee Christine. (2016). Comparisons of Physical Activity and Walking between Korean Immigrant and White Women in King County, WA. Journal Of Immigrant & Minority Health, 18(6), 1541 – 1546.

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Abstract

Immigrant and minority women are less physically active than White women particularly during leisure time. However, prior research demonstrates that reported household physical activity (PA) and non-leisure time walking/biking were higher among the former. Using accelerometers, GPS, and travel logs, transport-related, home-based, and leisure time PA were measured objectively for 7 days from a convenience sample of 60 first-generation Korean immigrant women and 69 matched White women from the Travel Assessment and Community Project in King County, Washington. Time spent in total PA, walking, and home-based PA was higher among Whites than Korean immigrants regardless of PA type or location. 58 % of the White women but only 20 % of the Korean women met CDC's PA recommendations. Socio-economic status, psychosocial factors, and participants' neighborhood built environmental factors failed to account for the observed PA differences between these groups.

Keywords

Accelerometer; Gps; Korean Immigrant Women; Objective Measures; Physical Activity; Walking; White Women; Nonleisure Time; Leisure-time; Environment; Transportation; Adults; Women; Socioeconomic Status; Time Use; Home Based; Environmental Aspects; Economic Status; Immigrants; Leisure; Socioeconomic Factors; Bicycles; Psychosocial Factors; Comparative Analysis; Minority & Ethnic Groups; Physical Fitness; Regression Analysis; Accelerometers; Travel; Traveltime; Environmental Factors; Recreation; Neighborhoods; Hispanic Americans; Global Positioning Systems--gps; Social Support; Noncitizens; Data Collection; Asian Americans; Psychological Aspects; Households; White People; Asian People; King County Washington; United States--us

Anthropotechnology: Sloterdijk on Environmental Design and the Foamworlds of Co-Isolation

Mugerauer, Robert. (2016). Anthropotechnology: Sloterdijk on Environmental Design and the Foamworlds of Co-Isolation. Architecture And Culture, 4(2), 227 – 248.

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Abstract

The paper has two primary goals. The first is to reexamine the dynamics of cultural change by applying the innovative interpretations of German theorist and cultural historian Peter Sloterdijk, who contends that the ways we traditionally have made and understood our built environment are grossly inadequate in our contemporary media-saturated, war-weary, biotechnological world. The second is to show how such a reinterpretation of space, architecture, and culture could help us to learn to design better and act by way of an anthropotechnology (Sloterdijk's word) that is simultaneously developmental and threatening - that might enable us to find an orientation in a world of complexity, and thus more positively shape our lives and future world. Sloterdijk's intriguing concepts - spheres of immunization (bubbles, globes, foams), co-isolation, dyads, tensegrity - hold great promise for the next pulse of architectural, planning, and construction theory.

Keywords

Peter Sloterdijk; Anthropotechnology; Spheres Of Immunization (bubbles, Globes, Foams); Co-isolation; Housing

The Residential Effect Fallacy in Neighborhood and Health Studies Formal Definition, Empirical Identification, and Correction

Chaix, Basile; Duncan, Dustin; Vallee, Julie; Vernez-moudon, Anne; Benmarhnia, Tarik; Kestens, Yan. (2017). The Residential Effect Fallacy in Neighborhood and Health Studies Formal Definition, Empirical Identification, and Correction. Epidemiology, 28(6), 789 – 797.

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Abstract

Background: Because of confounding from the urban/rural and socioeconomic organizations of territories and resulting correlation between residential and nonresidential exposures, classically estimated residential neighborhood-outcome associations capture nonresidential environment effects, overestimating residential intervention effects. Our study diagnosed and corrected this residential effect fallacy bias applicable to a large fraction of neighborhood and health studies. Methods: Our empirical application investigated the effect that hypothetical interventions raising the residential number of services would have on the probability that a trip is walked. Using global positioning systems tracking and mobility surveys over 7 days (227 participants and 7440 trips), we employed a multilevel linear probability model to estimate the trip-level association between residential number of services and walking to derive a naive intervention effect estimate and a corrected model accounting for numbers of services at the residence, trip origin, and trip destination to determine a corrected intervention effect estimate (true effect conditional on assumptions). Results: There was a strong correlation in service densities between the residential neighborhood and nonresidential places. From the naive model, hypothetical interventions raising the residential number of services to 200, 500, and 1000 were associated with an increase by 0.020, 0.055, and 0.109 of the probability of walking in the intervention groups. Corrected estimates were of 0.007, 0.019, and 0.039. Thus, naive estimates were overestimated by multiplicative factors of 3.0, 2.9, and 2.8. Conclusions: Commonly estimated residential intervention-outcome associations substantially overestimate true effects. Our somewhat paradoxical conclusion is that to estimate residential effects, investigators critically need information on nonresidential places visited.

Keywords

Self-rated Health; Record Cohort; Physical-activity; Transportation Modes; Built Environment; Activity Spaces; Research Agenda; Risk-factors; Associations; Exposure

The Relationship between Objectively Measured Walking and Risk of Pedestrian–Motor Vehicle Collision

Quistberg, D. Alex; Howard, Eric J.; Hurvitz, Philip M.; Moudon, Anne V.; Ebel, Beth E.; Rivara, Frederick P.; Saelens, Brian E. (2017). The Relationship between Objectively Measured Walking and Risk of Pedestrian–Motor Vehicle Collision. American Journal Of Epidemiology, 185(9), 810 – 821.

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Abstract

Safe urban walking environments may improve health by encouraging physical activity, but the relationship between an individual's location and walking pattern and the risk of pedestrian-motor vehicle collision is unknown. We examined associations between individuals' walking bouts and walking risk, measured as mean exposure to the risk of pedestrian-vehicle collision. Walking bouts were ascertained through integrated accelerometry and global positioning system data and from individual travel-diary data obtained from adults in the Travel Assessment and Community Study (King County, Washington) in 2008-2009. Walking patterns were superimposed onto maps of the historical probabilities of pedestrian-vehicle collisions for intersections and midblock segments within Seattle, Washington. Mean risk of pedestrian-vehicle collision in specific walking locations was assessed according to walking exposure (duration, distance, and intensity) and participant demographic characteristics in linear mixed models. Participants typically walked in areas with low pedestrian collision risk when walking for recreation, walking at a faster pace, or taking longer-duration walks. Mean daily walking duration and distance were not associated with collision risk. Males walked in areas with higher collision risk compared with females, while vehicle owners, residents of single-family homes, and parents of young children walked in areas with lower collision risk. These findings may suggest that pedestrians moderate collision risk by using lower-risk routes.

Keywords

Traffic Accidents; Confidence Intervals; Geographic Information Systems; Health Promotion; Maps; Research Funding; Walking; Accelerometry; Physical Activity; Data Analysis Software; Diary (literary Form); Descriptive Statistics; Risk Factors; Washington (state); Accidents; Environment Design; Global Positioning Systems; Pedestrians; Risk Assessment; Traffic; Physical-activity; Built Environment; Traffic Safety; Accident Risk; Injury Rates; Route-choice; Exposure; Gps; Travel; Accidents, Traffic

Neighborhood Food Environment, Dietary Fatty Acid Biomarkers, and Cardiac Arrest Risk

Mooney, Stephen J.; Lemaitre, Rozenn N.; Siscovick, David S.; Hurvitz, Philip; Goh, Charlene E.; Kaufman, Tanya K.; Zulaika, Garazi; Sheehan, Daniel M.; Sotoodehnia, Nona; Lovasi, Gina S. (2018). Neighborhood Food Environment, Dietary Fatty Acid Biomarkers, and Cardiac Arrest Risk. Health & Place, 53, 128 – 134.

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Abstract

We explored links between food environments, dietary intake biomarkers, and sudden cardiac arrest in a population-based longitudinal study using cases and controls accruing between 1990 and 2010 in King County, WA. Surprisingly, presence of more unhealthy food sources near home was associated with a lower 18:1 trans-fatty acid concentration ( - 0.05% per standard deviation higher count of unhealthy food sources, 95% Confidence Interval [CI]: 0.01, 0.09). However, presence of more unhealthy food sources was associated with higher odds of cardiac arrest (Odds Ratio [OR]: 2.29, 95% CI: 1.19, 4.41 per standard deviation in unhealthy food outlets). While unhealthy food outlets were associated with higher cardiac arrest risk, circulating 18:1 trans fats did not explain the association.

Keywords

Fatty Acids; Biological Tags; Cardiac Arrest; Food Contamination; Standard Deviations; Food Supply; Out-of-hospital Cardiac Arrest; Residence Characteristics; Sudden Cardiac Death; Trans Fatty Acids; New-york-city; Acute Myocardial-infarction; Low Socioeconomic-status; United-states; Vascular Inflammation; Cardiovascular Health; Older-adults; Death; Epidemiology; Arrhythmias; Dietary Supplements; Biomarkers; Heart Attacks; Risk Factors; Diet; Heart; Healthy Food; Fats; Dietary Intake; Food Sources; Food; Confidence Intervals; Biological Markers; Myocardial Infarction; Population Studies; Food Intake; Correlation Analysis; Neighborhoods