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The paper presents an improved plane layout for stabilizing piles based on a proposed piecewise function expression for the irregular driving force. Based on the specific morphological characteristics of a highway landslide, the piecewise function is used to calculate the irregular driving force by dividing the landslide into several sub-areas. Furthermore, the reasonable layout range and pile spacing can be obtained based on the piecewise function expression of the irregular driving force and on relevant research results of the plane layout for stabilizing piles. Therefore, an improved plane layout of stabilizing piles is presented in consideration of a piecewise function expression of the irregular driving force. A highway landslide located in eastern Guizhou Province, China, is analyzed as a case study using the proposed method. The results demonstrate that the theory presented in this paper provides improved economic benefits and can reduce the required number of stabilizing piles by 28.6% compared with the conventional plane layout scheme. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: In this paper, we construct and use a piecewise linear method to model and forecast, on a monthly basis, the demand for Macau tourism. Data over the period January 1991–December 2005 and a seasonally adjusted series for tourism demand are used. The study examines 4 forecasting horizons ranging from 6 to 24 months in advance. Mean absolute percentage errors and root mean square errors are adopted as criteria for evaluating the accuracy of the forecasting exercises. Finally, the forecasts of piecewise linear model are compared with those of autoregressive trend model, seasonal autoregressive integrated moving average and its arch-rival fractionally integrated autoregressive moving average models. The piecewise linear model is more accurate than the three benchmark models tested and the improvement is practically significant. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]