SMART Infrastructure Facility - Papers

Hybrid agent based simulation with adaptive learning of travel mode choices for University commuters

Nagesh Shukla — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 19:00:15 PDT

This paper presents a methodology for developing a hybrid agent-based micro-simulation model to capture the impacts of commuter travel mode choices on a University campus transport network. The proposed methodology involves: (i) developing realistic population of commuter agents (students and staff); (ii) assigning activity lists and travel mode choices to agents using machine learning method; and, (iii) traffic micro-simulation of the study area transport network. This furthers the understanding of current transport modal distributions, factors affecting the travel mode choice decisions, and, network performance through a number of hypothetical travel scenarios.

Australia's defence: a review of the 'reviews'

Henry Ergas — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 20:45:08 PDT

The Australian Defence Force is held in high regard; the Department of Defence is not. Longstanding concerns about inefficiency, compounded by a succession of fiascos and bungles, have entrenched the perception that Defence is poorly managed. Earlier attempts at reform have yielded mixed, often disappointing, results (see Ergas and Thomson 2011), and the years since 2009 have seen a series of reviews aimed at improving performance, culminating in 22 defence-related reviews in 2011–12 alone.

Assessing the likelihood of realizing idealized goals: the case of urban water strategies

Magnus Moglia — Thu, 31 Jan 2013 20:25:07 PST

Urban water management can be challenging, but in Small Island Developing States it is particularly difficult due to resource constraints and isolation. This is the situation in the town of Tarawa in Kiribati, where attempts to improve water services have often not led to the desired outcomes. The reasons are varied, and include widely a lack of consideration of local circumstances, process requirements, and inadequate involvement of affected stakeholders, and inadequate cross-sectoral coordination. In light of the tendency in urban water planning to assume only the idealized performance of strategies, the authors argue that there is a need to also formally consider the likelihood of realizing this idealized performance. It is difficult to assess such likelihoods, other than via the use of judgments by expert and local stakeholders. Such judgments are typically qualitative and fairly abstract and often not directly concerning a particular strategy. The current paper provides a methodology to assess the likelihood of the idealized performance of strategies, based on Bayesian Networks (BNs) and Subjective Logic (SL) utilizing expert and local knowledge, creating a capacity to capture and apply previous experiences, and dispersed knowledge in decision making and planning. The methodology has been developed and tested on water management strategies in the town of Tarawa, Kiribati. As such, this paper provides a method for mapping the causal explanations for why developments do not achieve their set goals, and the approach may form the basis for assessments to be more widely applied when evaluating urban water strategies in similar contexts. In this paper, the approach has been applied by using existing data from interviews and literature to evaluate one strategy, reserve extensions and groundwater extraction. Other strategies, i.e. rainwater harvesting, desalination and have also been evaluated but have not been described in this paper because of limited space. 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Simulating the dynamics of subsistence fishing communities: REEFGAME as a learning and data-gathering computer-assisted role-play game

Deborah Cleland — Thu, 31 Jan 2013 20:20:09 PST

REEFGAME is a computer-assisted role-playing game that explores the interactions among management strategies, livelihood options, and ecological degradation in subsistence fishing communities. The tool has been successfully used in the Philippines and a variety of student workshops. In the field, REEFGAME operated as a two-way learning tool, helping local fishers better understand their collective impacts on the marine ecosystem and providing researchers with insights into fisher livelihood strategies. This demonstrates the game's ability to serve as powerful springboard for social learning and discussion among stakeholders, while providing useful scientific insights into decisionmaking processes. Although not specifically designed for the purpose, REEFGAME has also been used in the university setting to facilitate student engagement and demonstrate a range of social and ecological concepts.

Reflections on case studies, modelling and theory builidng

Magnus Moglia — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 15:16:27 PST

Technology and knowledge sharing strategy in systems engineering practice performed by Indonesian expatriate engineers

I. Windiarti — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 15:16:26 PST

Challenges in freshwater management in low coral atolls

Ian White — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 15:16:25 PST

Climatic and Human Influences on Groundwater in Low Atolls

Ian White — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 15:16:24 PST

Multiple fault diagnosis using psycho-clonal algorithms

Nagesh Shukla — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 15:16:23 PST

Innovation diffusion among heterogeneous agents: exploring complexity with Agent-Based Modelling (ABM)

Nazmun Ratna — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 15:16:22 PST

Assessment and monitoring of the effects of the ComMod approach

Pascal Perez — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 15:16:21 PST

The effectiveness of health informatics

Francesco Paolucci — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 15:16:20 PST

Extending drug ethno-epidemiology using agent-based modelling

David Moore — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 15:16:19 PST

Modelling an urban water system on the edge of chaos

Magnus Moglia — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 15:16:17 PST

Water troubles in a Pacific atoll town

Magnus Moglia — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 15:16:16 PST

Urbanization and Water Development in the Pacific Islands

Magnus Moglia — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 15:16:15 PST

An agent-based model of alcohol use and abuse: SimARC

Francois Lamy — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 15:16:14 PST

Evaluating participatory modeling: Developing a framework for cross-case analysis

Natalie Jones — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 15:16:13 PST

Mental models: an interdisciplinary synthesis of theory and methods

Natalie Jones — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 15:16:12 PST

Assessing the impact of regulatory impact assessments

Mark Harrison — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 15:16:10 PST