Through the eye of an economist Thalmann explores 200 years of the dynamics of freight transport development in Switzerland and the United Kingdom. With a strong underlying theme concerned with the impact of government intervention on the efficiency of the freight transport system, Thalmann is able to provide an insight into the differences and similarities of the two countries who are currently the pioneers of this industry and thus make interesting case studies for the rest of Europe. Th...

From prominent political thinker and widely followed Slate columnist, a polemic on high rents and housing costs—and how these costs are hollowing out communities, thwarting economic development, and rendering personal success and fulfillment increasingly difficult to achieve.Rent is an issue that affects nearly everyone. High rent is a problem for all of us, extending beyond personal financial strain. High rent drags on our country’s overall rate of econom...

With a landmass of approximately 7000 square kilometres and a population of roughly five million, the Greater Toronto Area is Canada's largest metropolitan centre. How did a small nineteenth-century colonial capital become this sprawling urban giant, and how did government policies shape the contours of its landscape?In Toronto Sprawls, Lawrence Solomon examines the great migration from farms to the city that occurred in the last half of the nineteenth century. During this...

Capital is money that is invested in the expectation of a profit. Investors inevitably move their moneytowards the highest rate of interest and lowest risk of loss. The analogy of fungal growth is offered here.A fungus such as wood rot will extend many hyphae. Where water and nutrients are abundant a newfruiting body appears above ground as a mushroom – or a stock market. Dry spaces are a minor obstacleto fungal growth, and national boundaries are minor obstacle...

Why do we spend so much time stuck in traffic? After Peak Oil, do we face the prospect of Peak Travel? Does climate change mean no more foreign holidays? In Victorian times, Britain used to have the finest transport system in the world. Today, the future seems to belong to China with its ever growing High Speed Rail networks or Dubai and its titanic new five runway airport. What went wrong? For the last hundred years, the planners at the centre of our transport system have told us what roa...

The need for effective public transport is greater than ever in the 21st century. With countries like China and India moving towards mass-automobility, we face the prospects of an environmental and urban health disaster unless alternatives are found. It is time to move beyond the automobile age. But while public transport has worked well in the dense cores of some big cities, the problem is that most residents of developed countries now live in dispersed suburbs and smaller cities and town...

2015 Speaker's Book Award — ShortlistedCity planning in the GTHA has been mired in political grandstanding for the past decade, The New Urban Agenda offers a plain language solution to the issues plaguing the GTHA.Politics in the Greater Toronto, Hamilton Area (GTHA) have become increasingly divisive over the past decade, and solutions to the city’s problems have become hot-topic issues debated in council and the press, but never finding r...

This book provides an explanation of key underlying economic principles, allowing the reader to come to a better understanding of the critical factors that structure and guide transport markets. This is done through an examination of the interaction between the behaviour of individual users and providers of transport services and transport authorities actions through the implementation of transport policy. The book also considers on-going reforms in the organisation of all aspects of trans...

The editor and his contributors take an international perspective on the links between land use, development and transport and present the latest thinking, the theory and practice of these links. Authors from six countries - all experts in this area - have been commissioned to write chapters on the theoretical debates and more practical issues, via the use of detailed case studies.

The poor standard of current housing, and the inability of too many people on low incomes to access decent housing, is causing a cascade of problems that are avoidable.Housing affordability. Unhealthy homes. Wealth inequality. Environmental sustainability. Social mobility. The state of New Zealand housing is central to many major issues confronting this country. In this wide-ranging BWB Text, leading international housing researcher Philippa Howden-Chapman reveals how New Zealand has lost ...

Simon Sneddon is a Senior Lecturer in Law at the University of Northampton.

Most people do not know that already enacted in current law for 2013 are increases in the top tax rates of virtually every major federal tax. That is because the tax increases of Obamacare become effective that year, and the Bush tax cuts expire, which Obama has refused to renew for the nation’s small businesses, job creators and investors.Also by 2013 Obama’s regulatory tsunami will be building to a crescendo of increased costs on the economy. And the Fed, now committed to maintai...