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Roads are instrumental to market access. Electricity is a key technology for modern production. Both have been widely studied in isolation. In reality, infrastructure investments are commonly bundled. How such big push infrastructure investments interact in causing economic development, however, is not well understood. To this end, I first develop a spatial general equilibrium model to understand how big push infrastructure investments may differ from isolated investments. Second, I track the large-scale road and electricity network expansions in Ethiopia over the last two decades and present causal reduced-form evidence confirming markedly different patterns: access to an all-weather road alone increases services employment, at the expense of manufacturing. In contrast, additionally electrified locations see large reversals in the manufacturing employment shares. Third, I leverage the model to structurally estimate the implied welfare effects of big push infrastructure investments. I find welfare in Ethiopia increased by at least 11% compared to no investments, while isolated counterfactual road (electrification) investments would have increased welfare by only 2% (0.7%).

Smart motorway schemes aim to address congestion issues and improve journey time reliability by utilising a set of advanced Intelligent Transport Systems applications and making use of the existing road space as much as possible. The M42 Smart Motorway Pilot, introduced in September 2006 by the Highways Agency (known as Highways England since April 2015), established the concept of Hard Shoulder Running (HSR) for the first time in the UK, together with variable mandatory speed limits during periods of congestion. Following the success of the Pilot, smart motorways are being rolled-out to other sections of Highways England’s strategic road network. This research has been carried out to understand the performance of smart motorways and its limiting factors. A review of the concept of highways capacity was carried out to understand the parameters that influence traffic conditions during smart motorway operations. This was followed by a series of analysis using empirical data which examined the performance of existing smart motorways schemes on the M42 and M6 motorways near Birmingham, UK. Overall, smart motorway schemes have significantly reduced average journey times and journey time variability, improved motorway capacity and smoothed traffic flow. The level of benefits observed varied from one scheme to another mainly due to the different site conditions (road geometry, traffic demand and patterns). However, each scheme consistently demonstrated considerable improvements when compared to non-smart motorway conditions. One of the aims of smart motorways is to improve the distribution of traffic between lanes. Examination of the data showed that hard shoulder utilisation increased with traffic demand, however, it was potentially underutilised and influenced by the proportion of traffic leaving at the next junction. A multivariate analysis was carried out to establish a model which described motorway capacity during smart motorway operations using various traffic parameters. The findings from this research can be applied to assist in the application of smart motorways both in and outside of the UK, to reduce wasted time for commuters, business trips and freight movement. It is recommended that the study is taken further with the newly introduced smart motorway schemes, which will include additional parameters such as local physical characteristics of the road (e.g. width, gradient, curvature) and the operation of All Lane Running.

This study presents a newly developed micro-simulation model for motorway roadwork sections to evaluate the efficiency of different temporary traffic management schemes (TTMSs) such as the use of narrow lanes, offside and inside lane closures. The effect on traffic performance (i.e. capacity and delay) of various parameters (e.g. flow rates, percentage of heavy goods vehicles, roadwork zone lengths and speed limits) has been tested. The reason for building this model from scratch is the inability of an industry standard software package (i.e. S-Paramics), which has been made available for this research, in appropriately presenting traffic behaviour at motorway roadwork sections. The newly developed micro-simulation model was built using the FORTRAN programming language. It was developed based on car-following, lane changing, gap acceptance, lane closure and narrow lanes rules. Data from four sources (taken from different sets of data from UK motorways sites) were collected and analysed. The data was used in developing, calibrating and validating the model. Observations from motorway roadwork sites with narrow lanes scheme show certain prominent drivers’ behaviours, namely avoiding passing HGVs on adjacent lanes and lane repositioning before passing an HGV. The simulation results revealed that, under low traffic demand, the use of narrow lanes scheme seems to perform better in terms of capacity and delay than both offside and inside lane closure schemes, whereas under high traffic demand associated with high HGVs percentage (i.e. ≥ 25%), the use of offside lane closure scheme seems to perform better in terms of capacity and delay than narrow lanes scheme and inside lane closure scheme. The simulation results showed that the presence of HGVs has a large impact on reducing site capacity. The model also suggests that a stricter speed limit compliance should be imposed on motorway roadwork sections with the use of narrow lanes TTMS in order to maintain higher section capacity and reduced delays. Regression analysis was carried out based on the simulation results in order to provide equations for use in estimating section capacity and delay.

This thesis advances on the road freight transport literature to explore Information and Communications Technology (ICT) use for sustainability performance in road freight transportation. It examines managerial perceptions of sustainability and ICT use practices in the Nigerian petroleum downstream industry, adopting a multi-theory perspective to explain the use of ICT as an intervention mechanism for meeting triple bottom line (3BL) sustainability objectives. Qualitative strategies are employed to design and implement the research inquiry, in line with the moderate constructionist philosophy that identifies with shared community knowledge. A multiple case study design is used to collect data from 13 polar cases using a triangulated approach that included 32 semi-structured interviews, observations and archival documents. Content and thematic analysis of the data was supported by NVivo11 software to establish results. Research findings affirm the predominant constructs of sustainability within the literature; however, they also highlight divergence in the concentration of performance across the different sustainability dimensions. Emphasising the role of contextual perceptions, the findings also establish integration of the resource based theory (RBV) and the relational corporate social responsibility (RCSR) theories as an adequate theoretical framework for explaining management’s use of ICT to aid 3BL sustainability performance in road freight transportation. Besides the conduct of a systematic literature review, the research findings contribute to the academic discourse on sustainability hierarchies by empirically demonstrating links between business contexts, managerial perceptions and sustainability focus. Additionally, they address theory gaps in the literature, contributing to the application of strategic management theories road freight transport research. From a practice perspective, the findings establish training and awareness gaps and this supports the development of the Downstream Road Freight Transport Sustainability Assessment Tool (DRoFTSAT); a self-assessment tool to aid managers in the planning, implementation and evaluation of ICT uses for sustainability.

Infrastructure is the main driver of prosperity and economic development. To fill the gap between increasing demand for infrastructure and supply, the role of the private financing has become increasingly critical. Concession contracts in which the investment cost is recovered via payments from the end users are the most dominant among all PPP types. Although this mechanism has been seen as an efficient way to achieve infrastructure projects in terms of realising the project on time and to budget, the demand risk faced in the operation stage has heavily limited this efficiency. Evidence has shown that shortfall in demand can seriously jeopardize the scheme’s viability. Demand is dependent on a range of interrelated, dynamic factors such as economic conditions, willingness to pay and tariff for using the facility. In addition, uncertainty is an inherent aspect of most demand-underlying factors which makes demand estimation subject to high level of uncertainty. However, this uncertainty is largely ignored by modellers and planners and single demand estimate is often used when evaluating the facility. Given the threat to the project success resulting from potential variation between predicted and actual demand, it is believed that a demand risk assessment model is essential. This research is therefore devoted to developing a system dynamics model to assess demand risk by capturing the factors affecting demand and their relationships and simulating their change over time. A system dynamics based conceptual model was developed for mapping factors affecting demand for service provided by a typical PPP concession project. The model has five Causal Loop Diagrams (CLDs) which include: socio-economic, public satisfaction, willingness to pay, competition and level of fee. Based on the developed conceptual model, a quantitative simulation model for assessing traffic demand in toll road projects was developed. This model has six sub-models which are: socio-economic, public satisfaction, willingness to pay, competition, toll and expansion factors sub-models. With the use of case study of M6 toll roads (UK), it was demonstrated the potential application of SD as a tool for the assessment of demand risk in toll roads. Univariate and multivariate sensitivity analysis, as well as risk analysis using Monte Carlo approach, were conducted using the developed SD model. Univariate sensitivity analysis helps identify the significance of the demand underlying factors when they change individually. Toll was identified as the most critical factor affecting toll traffic demand followed by congestion on the alternative un-tolled facility. Multivariate sensitivity analysis showed how demand changes when several factors change. Four scenarios were developed to show the impact of change in conditions and policies on the level of traffic. Monte Carlo simulation, on the other hand, provided level of demand with a range of confidence intervals. Providing such estimates of the expected value and the confidence level offers useful information throughout their ranges and creates overall risk profiles by providing the probability of achieving a specific result. The main contribution of the research is in the development of a system dynamics model as a tool for assessing demand in PPP projects and informing decision making, which is new to the area of demand risk modelling.

Equitable allocation of resources for roads and systematic prioritisation of road projects in developing countries is important in order to enhance equality of transport opportunities and to achieve sustainable developments. This has been recognised as a research problem as it has challenged stakeholders. Existing decision systems are complex, data intensive and equity is not considered appropriately whilst data is often obsolete or unreliable. Therefore, the crux of this research is to investigate and develop new approaches with specific emphasis on Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). This thesis offers a distinctive contribution to knowledge by proposing new equity-centred algorithms, Goal Programming (GP) models, formulae and frameworks/tools for SSA road sector which are based on expert opinion and literature evidence. Following establishment of Road Funds and Road Authorities in SSA and subsequent increase in resource allocations, a clear understanding of equity in road funds allocation and road scheme prioritisation is important as road transport is by far the most predominant form of transport in Africa. The premise of this thesis supported by expert opinion is that there has been a historical bias towards funding of capital investment road projects at the expense of maintenance of existing roads; and road funds distribution and road scheme prioritisation is often non-systematic. The research uses both quantitative and qualitative methods; and a two stage web-based survey. Salient road sector equity aspects analysed include funds allocation between: capital investment projects versus maintenance (macro); road network classes under maintenance (meso); and the various lower local government jurisdictions and prioritisation of competing road schemes (micro). The developed decision tools are then applied to critique road sector allocations and systems from the case study countries of Uganda, Ghana, Zambia, Kenya, Tanzania and Namibia. The study finds that inequity and political interference are commonplace in the SSA road sector and allocation formulae are important instruments to achieve Rawlsian equity thus ensuring equality of transport opportunities and sustainability. Furthermore, the study concludes that road maintenance funding ought to be increased following country specific needs assessments. Road funds allocation and road scheme selection should be multi-criteria based prioritising economic efficiency for national roads and social equity/multi-dimensional poverty for rural roads. Finally, it is recommended that the Rawlsian equity assessment tool, formulae, GP models and algorithms developed in this study which are based on expert identified factors and weightings (rankings); are used to mitigate the inequity in allocations and the haphazard road scheme prioritisation in SSA and other developing regions.

African roads give rise to ambivalence in both Africans and Africanists. Masquelier has pointed to the "profoundly contradictory nature of roads as objects of both fascination and terror", spaces "of both fear and desire". My research on the Accra-Kumasi road, one of Ghana's major highways, bore out these tensions. Both now and in the past, Ghanaians have associated this road with perils and potentialities, notably those of excessive speed, in Ghanaian English 'overspeeding'. Drawing on a year of ethnographic fieldwork, I explore the everyday lives of the people who dwell, work and move alongside the Accra-Kumasi road. I aim to contribute to the small but growing body of anthropological work on roads and within this, to a phenomenology of the practices and experiences of different road users. I introduce this world via a discussion of the stories and rumours concerning a particular section of the Ghanaian highway, which have to be understood in terms of the changing historical, political, economic and infrastructural contexts that its residents draw upon. I then turn from discourse to the practical ways that people navigate the frequently complex tasks of roadside dwelling and trading, commercial bus driving, and travelling. My ethnography encompasses the kinetic, spatial, entrepreneurial, sociable and at times religious practices of road users as they explore the opportunities and perils and uncertainties that are thrown up by and around the road. In analysing these practices, I consider in particular the perceptions, skills, bodies and emotions as they engage in intricate temporalities, diverse rhythms, and sensations of speed. Throughout my thesis, I demonstrate how the road as an experiential environment foregrounds people's recurrent concerns with matters of speed. Speed, definitely a commercial imperative on the Accra-Kumasi road, is perceived and performed within a range of 'dromocentric' (fast or rushed) practices. Yet people also encounter slowness and even standstill, and stress the values of waiting, relaxing and patience. I therefore trace Ghanaians' engagements with differing paces of movement and action, and with their contradictory sides: both appealing and perilous, able to reward but also to backfire. Experiences of the road are complexly enmeshed with a range of practices and preferences; they provoke dilemmas when competing and ambiguous speeds are at stake. These dilemmas of speed are not peculiar to the road; they also arise when other concerns of life in contemporary Ghana are brought into focus as speeds, perils and uncertainties mount up.

The aim of this thesis is to provide a framework for a decision making system to operate a highway network, to evaluate the impacts of maintenance activities, and to allocate limited budgets and resources in the highway network. This integrated model is composed of a network level traffic flow model (NTFM), a pavement deterioration model, and an optimisation framework. NTFM is applicable for both motorway and urban road networks. It forecasts the traffic flow rates during the day, queue propagation at junctions, and travel delays throughout the network. It uses sub-models associated with different road and junction types which typically comprise the highway. To cope with the two-way traffic flow in the network, an iterative algorithm is utilised to generate the evolution of dependent traffic flows and queues. By introducing a reduced flow rate on links of the network, the effects of strategies employed to carry out roadworks can be mimicked. In addition, a traffic rerouting strategy is proposed to model the driver behaviour, i.e. adjusting original journey plans to reduce journey time when traffic congestion occurs in the road network. A pavement age gain model was chosen as the pavement deterioration model, which is used to evaluate the current pavement condition and predict the rate of pavement deterioration during the planning period. It deploys pavement age gain as the pavement improvement indicator which is simple and easy to apply. Moreover, the deterministic pavement age gain model can be transformed to a probabilistic one, using the normal distribution to describe the stochastic nature of pavement deterioration. A multi-objective and multi-constraint optimisation model was constructed to achieve the best pavement maintenance and rehabilitation (M&R) strategy at the network level. The improved non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm (NSGA-II) is applied to perform system optimisation. Furthermore, the traffic operations on worksites, i.e. lane closure options, start time of the maintenance, and traffic controls, are investigated so as to prevent, or at least to reduce, the congestion that resulted from maintenance and reconstruction works. The case studies indicated that NTFM is capable of identifying the relationship between traffic flows in the network and capturing traffic phenomenon such as queue dynamics. The maintenance cost is reduced significantly using the developed optimisation framework. Also, the cost to the road users is minimised by varying the worksite arrangements. Consequently, the integrated decision making system provides highways agencies with the capability to better manage traffic and pavements in a highway network.

The vulnerability analysis of road networks has been receiving increased attention due largely to such disparate events as earthquakes and terrorist attacks. The current evaluations of performance of a road network tend to focus on the change of traffic .demand on the network .and the probability of damage events. A major difficulty is the forecasting of low-probability high-consequence events. The research described in this thesis examines the problem from the perspective of identifying the weakest or most vulnerable parts of the network. A new method to examine the vulnerability of road network systems has been developed. The purpose is to identify weaknesses in the form of the network independent of a model of traffic demand or other hazards. The core ideas are based on a previously developed theory of structural vulnerability together with graph theory and road traffic theory. Road networks are represented by graphs and the features of vertices and links are studied. The structural vulnerability theory is applied to road networks in the perspective of systems thinking, which is also the basis for the application of road vulnerability analysis to other network systems, such as railway networks, water pipe networks, electricity networks and the Internet. The major achievements include: (a) the development of a graphical and theoretical model of road circuits, (b) the presentation of a model that describes the relationship of traffic flow and speed) (c) the identification of new measures of road links and circuits such as the transmittance of road links and the well-formedness of road circuits, (d) the development of a new concept of a road cluster and the development of an algorithm for forming clusters, (e) the restructuring of a road network at various hierarchical levels of definition using sets of interconnected road clusters, (f) the development of an algorithm to unzip the hierarchical model so that various failure scenarios may be identified, (g) the examination of the potential applications of the analysis to other transport network systems, (h) the implementation of algorithms into computer programs and user-interactive windows using MATLAB. A selection of various examples of road networks has been used to demonstrate and test the analysis. It is concluded that high vulnerability failure scenarios for a road network are not always obvious and they may be low probability high impact scenarios. Through these scenarios the vulnerable parts of large road networks are identified so that they can be monitored and maintained to be a better form, which would increase robustness and reduce risk. The vulnerability analysis of road networks is potentially of use in the procedures of road network planning and performance improvement.

My ethnography begins providing its bibliographical, historical and geographic frameworks along the methodological issues in Chapter I. There, I outline the most explicit phenomena of postsocialism in Gjirokastër city, the introduction of private vehicles and private immobile property and their relationship with the radical transformations of the urban topography. This city today gradually centralises the road infrastructure, reflecting and facilitating the respective postsocialist social centralisation of spatial mobility and the increasing impact of the cross-border network on the social life of the city. The thesis continues in Chapter II with the history of motor-roads in Albania, with particular focus on the relationship between highways and modernisation during socialism and the paradox relationship between society and these infrastructures. During socialism Albanians had to build roads, but they were not able to use them, a process that paved in fact the way for the postsocialist social perceptions of roads and automobility. The main ethnographic and synchronic part begins in Chapter III and continues in Chapters IV and V where I study how the particular cross-border road network is perceived in postsocialist Gjirokastër, while I discuss its social agency after 1990. In Chapter III I focus on the contemporary road mythology in the city and I discuss it in reference other motifs of road mythology that are available in the bibliography. Chapters IV and V are the most important for the argument of the thesis as I emphasise the two most comprehensive road myths of the contemporary socio-cultural condition in Albania and I talk about their relationship with the actual materiality of that infrastructure in reference to the material dimensions of globalisation and transnationalism. In Chapter IV I present the politico-economic asymmetries of postsocialist capitalism in Albania as they are formed dialectically in the material and social constructions of Kakavije-Gjirokastër. In Chapter V, I continue with the dialectical scheme focusing on the social and material articulations of this transnationalism and fluidity from below, with focus on the ontological and material extension of the road: the houses built by migrants. There I show how the super-fluid and asymmetrical global relationships of the postsocialist transition are being familiarised and to a certain degree absorbed within the intimate material entity of the house, via the same road which incorporates and facilitates the international dependency of the society to the migratory process. The last chapter (VI) presents my conclusions emphasising the relationship between anthropology and roads, locating the current ethnography on the wider theoretical discussions on automobility infrastructures, space, time and scale.

The thesis examines the development of road communications within a relatively self-contained area of hills and valleys; their relationship with the local relief and geology, and their response to changes in the settlement pattern and local economy, from late medieval times to the latter part of the 19th century. By the 18th century a 3-tier pattern had developed: through-routes on the plateau or ridge tops, 'contour' tracks linking hill-side settlements, and 'vertical' tracks from valley floor to plateau top. The inadequacies of the parish road repair system led to the creation of toll-roads. Three such phases may here be distinguished. Firstly, the amendment of roads from the Severn to the edge of the Cotswolds; secondly, the development of long-distance routes across the plateau; thirdly, the construction of completely new alignments along, or close to, the valley bottom, reaching the plateau by sweeping sinuous curves. This last phase starts with the creation of the Nailsworth Turnpike Trust in 1780, though the example was not followed in the other valleys until the period 1800-1825. In each phase a close look is taken at the financing of a particular road, or group of roads. The first such is the audit of the Stroud Turnpike, which took place in 1734 as a result of public discontent over the newly-imposed tolls. The financial theme is central to the whole history of turnpikes and in fact it was not the coming of the railways that brought about the crisis in the system. The trusts had been in grave financial trouble by at least the 1820s, and numerous Parliamentary enquiries had tried to resolve the problem of debt but without success. In the Stroudwater area an attempt was made in the early 1850s to introduce many of the suggested remedies: how and why this attempt failed is discussed. But while the competition from railways certainly caused the extinction of long-distance coaching and allied services, the turnpike system itself continued for at least another 30 years, though with a diminished revenue in most trusts. The long-drawn-out process of unravelling the affairs of a turnpike until final dispiking is examined through the records of the Nailsworth Trust. From 1780 to the 1870s this trust is the exemplar for the area. Examined in detail are: the inception and inauguration of this new road, and the employment of a professional engineer, with competent road specificiations pre-dating the better-known work of McAdam by 30 years. Also examined are: problems of constructing a completely new road; the work of the various officials, the composition of the committee and the trust's administration; the raising of the initial capital and the collection of toll revenue, including a detailed examination of toll-farming in the later years. Allied matters are also looked at. At each change in the pattern of turnpike communications an appropriate financial problem is examined. Use is made throughout of numerous reproductions of contemporary maps and of original documents.