Happy Birthday Marie Curie!

Marie Skłodowska-Curie (7 November 1867 – 4 July 1934)
“Be less curious about people and more curious about ideas”

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Space transport systems: a new frontier

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I have been recently invited by the ITS International Magazine to write an article on space transport systems as a new frontier for transport planning and the benefits for Earth-based transport systems. The article starts by describing the global space exploration roadmap, highlighting key technological developments for human space missions to the Moon, Mars, and beyond. Then, it outlines the unique challenges of planning transport systems in space settlements, such as dealing with reduced gravity and extreme environmental conditions. A conceptual model is described, focusing on core elements like infrastructure, travel behaviour, and impacts on safety, health, and equity. Additionally, the paper discusses how space transport research can offer insights for improving Earth-based transport systems, particularly in vehicle design, resource efficiency, and multi-modal integration. The article is available here .  
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Welcome to my blog!

Conventionally, travel behaviour theory considers travel as a derived demand. This means that travel occurs just because we want to reach a destination and participate in an activity there. In other words, it is the final goal and the benefits to be got from it, that motivates us to make the trip. But is this always true ? I am pretty sure that the first who would disagree with this theory, which has significantly defined the development path of contemporary cities, would be Constantine P. Cavafy with his most known poem “ Ithaka ”: "As you set out for Ithaka hope the voyage is a long one, full of adventure, full of discovery ... Arriving there is what you are destined for. But do not hurry the journey at all. Better if it lasts for years, so you are old by the time you reach the island, wealthy with all you have gained on the way, not expecting Ithaka to make you rich ".   In my case, I would probably agree more with Cavafy, than the rigorous theory of the scientific...
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Stay local or go regional? Urban form effects on vehicle use at different spatial scales: A theoretical concept and its application to the San Francisco Bay Area

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Abstract: This paper explores the respective roles of local and regional characteristics of urban form on vehicle travel. We hypothesize that the effects of urban form on vehicle use at the local and regional levels are complementary, and we introduce the concept of local and regional action spaces, which are defined based on the accessibility of alternative means of transport within an acceptable travel time, to test this hypothesis. Multilevel and ordered logit models are developed for the San Francisco Bay Area to estimate the effects of urban form and socioeconomic characteristics on vehicle kilometers traveled (VKT) and vehicle trip frequency (for work, shopping, and social/recreational purposes). We find that the two urban scale characteristics exert complementary effects on VKT. However, because people in the San Francisco Bay Area display significantly lower VKT in the local than in the regional action space, we conclude that regional-scale inter-ventions woul...
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