Flood risk analysis is the instrument by which floodplain and stormwater utility managers create strategic adaptation plans to reduce the likelihood of flood damages in their communities, but there is a need to develop a screening tool to analyze watersheds and identify areas that should be targeted and prioritized for mitigation measures. The authors developed a screening tool that combines readily available data on topography, groundwater, surface water, tidal information for coastal communities, soils, land use, and precipitation data. Using the outputs of the screening tool for various design storms, a means to identify and prioritize improvements to be funded with scarce capital funds was developed, which combines the likelihood of flooding from the screening tool with a consequence of flooding assessment based on land use and parcel size. This framework appears to be viable across cities that may be inundated with water due to sea-level rise, rainfall, runoff upstream, and other natural events. The framework was applied to two communities using the 1-day 100-year storm event: one in southeast Broward County with an existing capital plan and one inland community with no capital plan.

The wealth of nations depends on the quality of their infrastructure. Often, however, infrastructure suffers from ineffective investments and poor maintenance. Proposed solutions, such as New Public Management or Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) tend to develop into Politicians-Private Partnerships as politicians collude with private firms to exploit present and future tax-payers. Therefore, it is necessary to give citizens better control over collective decision making. While there is a significant economic literature on empowering citizens via decentralization and direct democratic institutions, the role of electoral rules has thus far been rather neglected. An interesting case in point is Switzerland, which is well known for its high-quality infrastructure, extensive decentralization, and direct democracy. However, this paper argues that there is an additional and previously neglected institution that moves Swiss politicians away from client politics towards better serving public interest: Switzerland’s unique electoral institutions which effectively combine proportional elections with multi-seat majority elections. We explain how these institutions work, how they enhance the relationships between citizens and public and private entities, and we argue that they could be implemented in other countries.

Japan’s investment in the domestic construction industry has fallen to less than half its peak in 1992. Given the country’s declining population, Japanese construction companies must go global to remain profitable. To what extent the Japanese government and Japanese companies can contribute to meeting the growing infrastructure needs in the region is unclear as Japanese companies have long been operating primarily in Japan. The Japanese government has in recent years passed a series of new laws that encourage private sector participation in financing, building and operating public infrastructure. Through involvement in such public projects, Japanese companies have developed the skills and technologies to build a variety of infrastructures that are resilient to natural disasters and adaptable to various geographical conditions and social and economic development. But the major challenge for Japanese companies is to transform their business model drastically from one that relies on the domestic market to one that contributes to the social and economic development of third countries.

A theoretical investigation of the effect of an inverse parabolic potential on third harmonic generation in cylindrical quantum wires is presented. The wave functions are obtained as solutions to Schrödinger equation solved within the effective mass approximation. It turns out that peaks of the third harmonic generation susceptibility (THGS) associated with nanowires of small radii occur at larger photon energies as compared to those associated with quantum wires of larger radii. The inverse parabolic potential red-shifts peaks of the THGS, and suppresses the amplitude of the THGS. THGS associated with higher radial quantum numbers is diminished in magnitude and blue-shifted, as a function of the photon energy. As a function of the inverse parabolic potential, the THGS still characterized by peaks, and the peaks shift to lower values of the potential as the photon energy increases.

In the domains of geological study, natural resource exploitation, geological hazards, sustainable development, and environmental management, lithological mapping holds significant importance. Conventional approaches to lithological mapping sometimes entail considerable effort and difficulties, especially in geographically isolated or inaccessible regions. Incorporating geological surveys and satellite data is a powerful approach that can be effectively employed for lithological mapping. During this process, contemporary RS-enhancing methodologies demonstrate a remarkable proficiency in identifying complex patterns and attributes within the data, hence facilitating the classification of diverse lithological entities. The primary objective of this study is to ascertain the lithological units present in the western section of the Sohag region. This objective will be achieved by integrating Landsat ETM⁺ satellite imagery and field observations. To achieve our objectives, we employed many methodologies, including the true and false color composition (FCC&TCC), the minimal noise fraction (MNF), principal component analysis (PCA), decoration stretch (DS), and independent component analysis (ICA). Our findings from the field investigation and the data presented offer compelling evidence that the distinct lithological units can be effectively distinguished. A recently introduced geology map has been incorporated within the research area. The sequence of formations depicted in this map is as follows: Thebes, Drunka, Katkut, Abu Retag, Issawia, Armant, Qena, Abbassia, and Dandara. Implementing this integrated technique enhances our comprehension of geological units and their impacts on urban development in the area. Based on the new geologic map of the study area, geologists can improve urban development in the regions by detecting building materials “aggregates”. This underscores the significance and potential of our research in the context of urban development.

The paper lays out basic design options for infrastructure policy. It first sketches mechanisms to assess demand. Then it sets out a hierarchy of issues starting with choice of market structure followed by conduct regulation. Ownership options are largely a function of market structure choices. The implications for finance—the topic of much day-to-day discussion in infrastructure policy-making—follow from these various prior choices. The discussion naturally circumscribes the role for the so-called public-private partnerships, their uses and pitfalls.