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Currently, most high-technology materials are inspected for quality after processing, with very low yields, great variability and high costs. Intelligent process control potentially enables much greater yields of highquality materials, which will reduce the designers' inhibitions about consideration of new, emerging materials in the design of new products, and enable their earlier introduction into systems and their components. Development of concurrent engineering tools and systems, with the development of intelligent processing of materials technology as a cornerstone to concurrent engineering, will then lead to long-term changes in the way that organizations conduct product development. Potential benefits include a large reduction in the time required to develop new products, increased quality and reduced life-cycle costs.
Bus rapid transit (BRT) has emerged as a frequent option in the development of the long-range transit plans for urban areas in the United States. This has come about because of the growing number of BRT success stories in the United States and around the world, because of a desire to consider lower-cost investment options at a time of limited resources, and because of encouragement from FTA. The key to the success of BRT is its potential to increase transit service quality and ridership meaningfully at an affordable price. As the BRT concept is evolving, issues in regard to federal funding for BRT investments are critical to localities considering BRT investments. Not surprisingly, there is a growing interest in how best to fund BRT and specifically how best to position BRT with respect to existing federal funding programs and programming processes. A review was conducted of the background context on BRT including the definition and cost history of BRT. There is also a discussion of the current and possible future eligibility for existing and proposed funding programs at the federal level. Three alternative strategies were considered: eliminating the fixed-guideway restrictions of the New Starts Program without turning it into a conventional bus program, expanding the funds available enough under the Bus Capital Program to fund BRT with incentives to encourage true BRT projects, and creating an entirely new BRT funding program. The conclusion addresses issues to be considered as BRT federal funding eligibility is determined.
The costs and benefits of integrating two major areas of urban transportation enhancement—high-occupancy toll (HOT) lanes and bus rapid transit (BRT)—are explored. The goal is to assess a synergistic strategy of providing premium public transit services in conjunction with roadway pricing strategies. The use of BRT is specifically addressed in the context of a congested urban travel corridor with roadway value pricing. A simple simulation is used to determine those circumstances in which BRT might be an effective element of a multimodal value-pricing corridor strategy. The model used is a variation of SMITE (Spreadsheet Model for Induced Travel Estimation) extended to include managed lanes developed previously by DeCorla-Souza at FHWA. The analysis simulated some alternatives differing from those included in the original DeCorla-Souza assessment of options for the Capital Beltway in Northern Virginia. This is currently a 14-mi-long, 8-lane freeway with no restricted lanes. Seven alternatives are examined. Six of the alternatives place an additional lane in each direction, for a total of 10 lanes. The seventh alternative takes a lane in each direction to provide a special-purpose lane in each direction. The findings suggest that both roadway pricing and BRT compare favorably with toll-free facilities and conventional transit. Taking a lane for a combined HOT facility with BRT might be particularly cost-effective in select locations.
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