Rural living in city and countryside: Demand and supply in the Netherlands

Rural living has great appeal among urban residents in the Netherlands. It echoes the rural idyll. Furthermore, there is a demand for rural living in or near urban areas, in the so-called pseudo-countryside. This paper investigates the demand for rural living. In addition, this paper seeks to find out how and to what extent suppliers in the housing market accommodate that demand. Besides building rural residential environments, suppliers try to influence preferences for rural housing through marketing techniques. Where possible, developers build certain types of houses for which they know there is a demand, as that yields the highest profits. Yet the supply of rural residential environments does not meet the demand. The tension between the two components can partly be explained by restrictive government policies. The creation of a pseudo-countryside, a residential environment with the characteristics of the countryside but not located there, might be a compromise.     

A material supplier selection model for property developers using Fuzzy Principal Component Analysis

Nowadays, the participants in construction industry are facing pressure to meet the higher customer expectations under a tighter budget. On the other hand, an effective and efficient material supplier selection system has a significant effect in the business success of property developers. The aim of this study is to investigate a selection model based on Fuzzy Principal Component Analysis (PCA) for solving the material supplier selection problem from the perspective of property developers. First, the Triangular Fuzzy Numbers is used to quantify the decision makers' subjective judgments. Second, PCA is employed to compress the data of the selection criteria and eliminating the multicollinearity among them. Third, the linear combined score of PCA (SCORE_PCA) is used to rank the suppliers. Four material purchases are used to validate the proposed selection model. The results show that the proposed model can be adopted in construction material supplier selection by the property developers.     

Exploring customer satisfaction in Great Britain's retail energy sector part II: The increasing use of Trustpilot online reviews

GB retail energy suppliers significantly increased their use of Trustpilot from 2019 to 2020. Company executives explain how inviting reviews enabled them to improve customer service as well as increase TrustScore ratings. Some new entrants were particularly innovative. All but one of the large former incumbent suppliers then began to invite reviews and increased their TrustScores. TrustScores of suppliers exiting the market have increased in recent years, suggesting that customer dissatisfaction with suppliers was not the reason for their exit.     

The impact of governance structure on firm performance: An application to the German water distribution sector

This paper investigates the impact of governance structure on firm performance (i.e., retail prices) using a database of 765 German water suppliers. Controlling for scale economies as well as technical and structural characteristics, we find that private sector participation is accompanied with higher retail prices. Furthermore, Eastern states on average feature higher prices mirroring significant investments during the past two decades as well as network over-dimension. Assuming that managers make strategic decisions (e.g., governance form) not randomly but rather decide based on expectations of how their choices affect future performance, we test for this self-selection applying a two-stage model.     

Toward the digital water age: Survey and case studies of Australian water utility smart-metering programs

The role of ‘smart metering’ in demand management, customer service, labor optimization, and operational efficiency is becoming increasingly recognized by Australasian water utilities. The objectives of this paper are to provide a summary of the 2013 and 2014 surveys and in-depth interviews that were aimed at gauging the penetration of smart metering (SM) and intelligent water network (IWN) projects in Australian and New Zealand water utilities and to identify outputs and challenges faced subsequent to their implementation.The key insights are summarized as follows:• Smart meters and intelligent water networks are gaining momentum in Australasia, with at least 250,000 smart meters currently installed or planned for installation and 66% of the surveyed water businesses reporting projects underway or starting in the next 12 months.• Key business drivers were easier to quantify and justify on water system economics rather than customer engagement and satisfaction. There appears to be a business case for deployment of smart metering technology, particularly for utilities seeking to avoid costs by lowering operating costs, reducing wholesale bulk water purchases, and/or deferring augmentation of infrastructure.• Some utilities had well-advanced trials or operational rollouts, together with a similarly advanced understanding of the wider benefits of SM and IWN, while others were constrained by a lack of overall understanding and awareness of developing a business case, technology options, applications of data and the wider benefits of smart metering.• Each water utility should know and understand its business drivers and goals. The value of smart metering and the specific business case drivers are highly contextual to location (e.g., opportunities for cost avoidance). The social benefits of customer satisfaction, community acceptance, and improved customer engagement and trust were major ‘social’ drivers.• There is evidence that utilities are gaining an increased awareness of how digital metering and applying analytics of various data sets in near real-time, can benefit utility efficiency and customer service excellence. Aligned with data analytics was a clear focus towards the customer satisfaction (e.g. introducing web portals, leak alerts, two-way communications and customer consultation).• In the last 12 months there has been a doubling in the number of utilities that are pursuing intelligent water networks – the integration of intelligent devices including water meters, pressure sensors, meter data, into all relevant business processes and systems and using this information to guide strategy and investment.• As many respondents commented, there is an important need for an agreed upon and standardized set of definitions relating to smart-metering technology.     

Categorizing suppliers for development investments in construction: application of DEA and RFM concept

Supplier development plays a significant role in the cost, quality and delivery improvements of construction projects. However, there is limited research on analytical methods of categorizing and prioritizing a high number of suppliers for effective allocation of scarce development resources. This research aims to develop an objective model to categorize a general contractor’s suppliers. To do so, we use three concepts from different research backgrounds – recency, frequency and monetary value (RFM); data envelopment analysis (DEA); and the customer pyramid – and add the number of projects (P) shared with each supplier as a context-related variable to build a novel RFMP model. The model categorizes suppliers into four levels of the supplier pyramid, utilizing historical data on supplier–contractor transactions. To test the model in practice, we adopt a case study of an international construction company in Finland. The results reveal that a supplier’s RFMP score reflects its contribution to the contractor’s business; therefore, development investments should vary, based on a supplier’s position in the supplier pyramid. This research contributes to the knowledge on supply chain management in construction by combining three approaches – RFM, DEA and the customer pyramid – into a single objective model to categorize suppliers for effective development investments.     

Turning dreams into specifications. II

For pt.I see ibid., vol.3, no.1, p.22-6, 1993. The first stage of design engineering is to turn the abstract and (usually) ill-formed idea of the customer (his `dream') into a concrete statement of requirements against which suppliers can tender and carry out detailed design (a `specification'). The eventual success of the project hinges on getting that step right. Having already described the process in general terms and illustrated it with a simple example, the author now looks at some of the tools and techniques which are used to carry it out     

Weekly line planning to improve the match between rail supply and passenger demand

Traditional railway line planning approaches are used to determine the best train lines during specified periods (e.g., 1 day, 1 h, or several hours). However, mismatches occur relative to the spatiotemporal changes in travel demands over longer time periods (e.g., 1 week). To more effectively match rail supply with passenger demand, a weekly line planning (WLP) model considering both peak and nonpeak passenger demand over an entire week and during all periods of each day is proposed. This model maximizes the defined supply–demand matching utility and minimizes train operational cost. Important constraints to ensure proper daily and hourly train repetition over multiple days are included. A customized genetic algorithm (GA) is developed, which outperforms the CPLEX solver in real-world cases of high-speed railways in China. Compared with practical and single-day planning, WLP shows clear improvement in terms of operational cost, passenger travel speed, and supply–demand matching.     

Transportation Demand Management Planning,Development, and Implementation

Transportation demand management (TDM) is the art of modifying travel behavior, usually to avoid more costly expansion of the transportation system. TDM is not a panacea, but it can help ease some transportation problems. TDM requires the cooperation of many actors, who may include developers; landowners; employers; business associations; and municipal, county, regional, and state levels of government. This article reviews new TDM organizational forms, including transportation management associations, trip reduction ordinances, and negotiated public-private agreements. More flexible approaches appear to work best. TDM evaluation is difficult, because reductions in trip generation rates, i.e., relative changes in travel demand, are not easy to measure. Evidence suggests that TDM can be applied in a wide variety of situations, with equally variable, and sometimes quite good, overall results. TDM strategies that often have proven to be effective include on-site employee transportation coordination, parking management provisions, and alternative work schedules.     

澳门未来解决居住问题的对策——公共房屋

随着人口的增加,澳门住宅建造数量无法满足居民的需求。文章分析澳门住宅需求和存在的居住问题,提出在拥有85年建造公共房屋历史的澳门,公共房屋将能为特区政府和居民提供一条通向解决居住问题之路。文章还分析了以公共房屋作为解决居住问题的可行性、政府的作用、公共房屋的趋势等,力求让建筑和规划专业人士、城市开发和管理者更多地了解澳门,引发对解决居住问题对策的思考。     

A GIS approach to shopping mall location selection

Taking the advantage of information technology, geographic information systems (GIS) enable the handling of both spatial and non-spatial data for constructing thematic maps depicting a variety of demographic information relating to population, housing, and economic activities. Its application on the technical area in the construction industry is evident, while its usefulness to the non-technical area (e.g., business, economics) is being explored. In view of the potentiality of the GIS, this paper presents its utility for shopping mall location selection, which is one of the core business activities of developers for long-term capital investment. A GIS-based system uses electronic mapping technology in producing interactive multi-layer maps so that queries are set to find optimal solutions for problems. It combines spatial and non-spatial data to construct visualized information that can be easily analyzed by decision makers and that cannot be achieved in table or list forms. In the current paper, a project is demonstrated to create features associated with household incomes, demand points, etc. Queries are then created for finding solutions for four location problems: (1) minimum distance, (2) maximum demands coverage, (3) maximum incomes coverage, and (4) optimal center.     

Guidance on the usability-privacy tradeoff for utility customer data aggregation

Modern cities, along with their researchers and innovators can benefit from applying " big data" to their sustainability and infrastructure problems and policies, e.g., water and energy consumption. Unfortunately, current utility customer data (UCD) privacy rulemaking fails to ensure safe release of these data for the public benefit and does not currently strike a sound balance between the competing values of usability and privacy. This paper presents a statistical analysis of the tradeoff between usability and privacy for UCD in Los Angeles. The tradeoffs vary by economic sector (residential vs. commercial/industrial) and by utility type (water, electricity, natural gas). This paper provides guidance for safer and more ethically balanced aggregation and release of utility customer data.     

Assessing the public health risk of microbial intrusion events in distribution systems: conceptual model, available data, and challenges

Low and negative pressure events in drinking water distribution systems have the potential to result in intrusion of pathogenic microorganisms if an external source of contamination is present (e.g., nearby leaking sewer main) and there is a pathway for contaminant entry (e.g., leaks in drinking water main). While the public health risk associated with such events is not well understood, quantitative microbial risk assessment can be used to estimate such risk. A conceptual model is provided and the state of knowledge, current assumptions, and challenges associated with the conceptual model parameters are presented. This review provides a characterization of the causes, magnitudes, durations and frequencies of low/negative pressure events; pathways for pathogen entry; pathogen occurrence in external sources of contamination; volumes of water that may enter through the different pathways; fate and transport of pathogens from the pathways of entry to customer taps; pathogen exposure to populations consuming the drinking water; and risk associated with pathogen exposure.     

Customer bill impacts of energy efficiency and net-metered photovoltaic system investments

Utility regulators and policymakers are concerned about potential increases in retail rates driven by energy efficiency (EE) programs and distributed solar photovoltaic (PV) systems, which may adversely affect utility customers that do not invest in these technologies (i.e., non-participants) and more so than those that do (i.e., participants). We assess customer bill impacts of illustrative EE programs and net-metered PV systems for a prototypical northeast utility. We find that the timing of customer EE or PV investments matters and that modest energy savings may fail to yield financial benefits sufficient to offset concomitant increases in retail rates.     

Residential energy contracts and the 28 day rule

What measures are needed to protect customers when a utility market is first opened to competition? In the UK, residential (domestic) customers must be able to terminate energy contracts at 28 days' notice. This rule was introduced as a transitional protection for customers and for competition. However, the regulatory justification for the rule seems to have evolved over time. Removing the rule could have a number of advantages, including the development of fixed-price fixed-term contracts. The advantages of retaining the rule are questionable. In other retail sectors there is no regulatory concern or requirement of this kind. UK electricity suppliers have begun to offer capped prices for specified periods of time, suggesting that there is a growing customer demand for this. Fixed-price fixed-term contracts are a common form of competition in Scandinavia. The 28 day rule no longer seems necessary to protect customers and is more likely to distort than to protect competition. In retrospect, it would have been preferable not to introduce the rule in the first place.     

Impact of relationship value on project portfolio success — Investigating the moderating effects of portfolio characteristics and external turbulence

Companies today need project portfolio management (PPM) to cope with the increasing number of projects and use it to ensure comprehensive management, strategic alignment, and efficient use of resources. Moreover, customers are demanding more value from their suppliers. The management of a project portfolio and the corresponding customer relationship portfolio implies a link between PPM and relationship management. By combining the fields of PPM and marketing, this study hypothesizes a connection between relationship value and project portfolio success. Because both parties need to extract value from a relationship, relationship value is divided into relationship value for the customer and relationship value from the customer. The results are based on a cross-industry sample of 174 German, Swiss, and Austrian medium-sized and large companies and rely on two informants from each firm. We find a significant relationship between relationship value and project portfolio success as well as moderating effects of portfolio interdependency, portfolio size, and technological turbulence.     

设计师、开发商、住户三位一体住宅设计机制建设的探索

住户是住宅的最终消费者,开发商只有满足住户的需求才能成功。建立开发商、设计师、住户互通的住宅建设机制已成为一种需要和必然。设计师应当负起开发商与住户间“对话”的责任;开发商应以住户需要为市场定位;住户应变被动为主动,积极参与住宅设计。三位一体的设计机制,将带来良好的社会和经济效益。     

Uncertain data and expert opinions in the assessment of the unavailability of suppression systems

The probability distribution of the demand unavailability of water-based special suppression systems (e.g., sprinklers) for nuclear power plants is developed from direct nuclear experience and indirect evidence from tests and non-nuclear applications. The indirect evidence is treated as expert estimates, and is combined with the direct evidence using Bayes' theorem. The credibility of the estimates is explicitly modeled in the likelihood function. The sensitivity of the results to the major assumptions of the model is investigated.     

Turning dreams into specifications. I

The first stage of design engineering is to turn the abstract and (usually) ill-formed idea of the customer (his `dream') into a concrete statement of requirements against which suppliers can tender and carry out detailed design (a `specification'). The eventual success of the project hinges on getting that step right. In this part of the article the author describes the process in general terms and illustrates it with a simple example     

Enabling independent flexibility service providers to participate in electricity markets: A legal analysis of the Belgium case

Ambitious renewables targets of the EU call for creating a flexible electricity system accommodating and facilitating the integration of large-scale intermittent renewable electricity. To further exploit the considerable potential of demand flexibility, final customers need to be fully mobilised to offer their flexibility to electricity markets. The independent flexibility service provider (IFSP) operates independently from the electricity supplier and has a separate balance responsible party (BRP), which plays a key role to that end. However, in activating demand flexibility, suppliers and BRPs are affected and thus likely to impose barriers or restrictions on market entry of IFSPs. This analysis utilizes legal-empirical research to closely examine how to promote broader market participation of IFSPs by regulating their relationships with affected suppliers and BRPs. In doing so, the Belgian regulatory framework is used as a case study. This article further analyses the remaining regulatory gaps and challenges of the Belgian framework.