Traffic Management is a huge problem in large cities. Absence of technological support to complement road safety measures results in loss of precious human lives and severe implications to our environment. According to National Highway Traffic Safety administration (Fatal Car Accidents, 2005), around 43,000 people were killed in accidents, millions of people were injured and the economic conseq...

Understanding purchase behavior of people in city environment can have important implications in the design and management of cities and the study of urban economy. Traditional studies have proposed to use gravity-based spatial interaction (Huff) model [1, 2] or discrete choice model [3] to model individual purchase behavior. These models treat individual purchases separately and do not explici...

Current research treats walkability in cities as an urban asset, to be identified by formal methods in order to let people benefit from it. In this paper, we take an activity-based view on the subject, arguing that walkability is not an end in itself but must always be seen from the standpoint of a specific activity to be performed. More precisely, we look at the specific walkability when seeki...

The past few decades have seen many downtowns across the U.S., especially in small rural cities, experience declines. Adding to the problem, globalization has changed the Midwest forever with offshore competition for routine jobs. Traditional small family farms are vanishing, steel mills have closed, and many factories have shrunk or moved overseas. The Midwest, which was once a symbol of stabi...

In Sweden, human cases of Puumala hantavirus (PUUV) infections are reported from the northern endemic regions. We found hantavirus-specific antibodies in yellow-necked mice (Apodemus flavicollis) trapped in human dwellings in the surroundings of the cities of Uppsala and Stockholm, which are situated far south from the traditional endemic areas of PUUV. Because the yellow-necked mouse is the mo...

This paper presents an analysis of the geography of the booming ‘Islamic financial services’ (IFS) sector, which provides a host of financial services based on Islamic religious grounds. The relevance of such an analysis is discussed against the conceptual backdrop of the world city network literature. It is argued that a focus on the globalization of the IFS sector may provide an alternative t...

Most cultural-led redevelopment projects in today’s global cities are devised with the clear objective of stimulating their economic growth. Redevelopment schemes usually aim to develop consumption services and urban settings to make the city more attractive for investors. In many cases, redevelopment has led to a diminishment in diversity of local cultural spaces in the inner-city areas. Histo...

The percentage of the world's population living in urban areas will increase from 50% in 2008 to 70% (4.9 billion) in 2025. Crowded urban areas in developing and industrialized countries are uniquely vulnerable to public health crises and face daunting challenges in surveillance, response, and public communication. The revised International Health Regulations require all countries to have core ...

In the modern world, cities need to keep up with the demand for mobility, efficient infrastructure and environmental sustainability. The future smart cities use intelligent information and communication technologies to raise the quality of life. This includes computer vision as one of the main technologies. It can observe and analyse human activities from a distance in a noninvasive manner. Tra...

The challenges of rapid urbanisation in large parts of Africa are beyond the capacity of local government to manage. The paper explores the arguments for a national urban policy to complement local strategies, reflecting the unique power of the central state and the special circumstances of cities. With appropriate support, urbanisation could become a more positive force for economic and human ...