Research Publications

Recent Submissions

Now showing 1 - 10 of 20248

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  Sandy Springs Homeownership Assessment and Policy Recommendations

  (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2024-04) Kaufman, Mira

  The city of Sandy Springs hopes to preserve and develop more housing in its area to ensure that young adults with families and first-time homeowners set down roots in the city. Land prices have risen steadily in Sandy Springs, and the local government aims to introduce strategies and protections to maintain and develop affordable housing stock for this demographic. Entry-level homeownership opportunities are crucial to the continued vibrancy of the community and for future growth. Without plentiful accessibly priced homes, the city’s demographics will continue to skew towards older and wealthier residents, reducing the diversity and resilience of the community. This project analyzes the housing market of Sandy Springs using the American Community Survey (ACS) and Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA) data and recommends strategies for providing adequate homeownership opportunities to support the city’s desired future residents. ACS data is used to examine changes that have occurred in the homeowner population in Sandy Springs between 2018 and 2022. To provide further insights into homeownership, the HMDA dataset shows the types of mortgage loan applicants in Sandy Springs in 2018 and 2022. This data illuminates specific challenges for young families and professionals in originating mortgages. The literature review and recommendations sections highlight potential policy action relating to the goal of increased homeownership for adults starting families and other early professionals in the city.
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  Evaluation of Whiteman Airport’s Operational Future and Exploration of Equitable Transit-Oriented Development as an Alternative Use

  (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2024-04-25) Vitti, Dominique

  Community members in Pacoima, California have been urging for the closure of Whiteman Airport (WHP) due to various concerns, including air and noise pollution, inadequate communication from the airport after accidents, public safety risks, and limited community benefits. Groups opposed to a WHP closure believe the municipal airport provides many benefits to the Los Angeles (LA) region such as opportunities for aviation education, jobs, emergency services, and critical air traffic relief for nearby airports. As the owners of WHP, Los Angeles County has made incremental progress towards rectifying community harms. After an extensive community engagement process, called Re-envisioning Whiteman Airport , Los Angeles County Department of Public Works determined that some recommended improvements are dependent on the long-term future of the airport. If the LA County Board of Supervisors decides to pursue an airport closure as a long-term solution, the Department of Public Works estimates that a full redevelopment study for the airport land would take five to ten years. This study seeks to serve as preliminary research for that redevelopment study and explore an alternative use of the land that may better serve the community: equitable transit-oriented development (ETOD).
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  The Outdated Procedural Law of Planning

  (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2024-04) Hulett, Charlie

  Planning started in the 1920s as simplistic delineations of land. Zoning and planning have since progressed to complicated designs of districts, overlays, and built environment standards, among others. What has not changed are the procedural rules of bringing planning and zoning decisions to life. Based on traditional systems of democracy, procedures in planning seek only to act as the minimum standard of conduct despite producing genuine impacts, akin to substantive law. This paper seeks to illuminate those procedures in Georgia and begin the conversation for planners to consider what has long been treated as local government attorneys’ responsibility, alone.
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  Municipal Food Scrap Composting Programs: What Can Atlanta Learn from Programs Around the Country?

  (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2024-04-25) Chen, Alicia

  In 2022, the United States Department of Agriculture recognized the utility of composting programs and launched Composting and Food Waste Reduction cooperative agreements. Through the agreements, $10.2 million were awarded to fund pilot projects that develop and implement strategies for food waste reduction and compost plans (and increase access to compost for local agricultural producers). The City of Atlanta won one of the grants to pilot its own food waste composting program in 2022 and pilot programs have also been started in the adjacent cities of East Point and Decatur in 2023. As these services are being implemented, it is a prime time to explore and understand what policies should be included in a successful municipal food waste composting program and to discern how existing programs around the country are actually performing. This paper will aim to answer the following questions: Which municipal food scrap composting program best practices are actually being implemented around the country? Which best practices should Atlanta prioritize implementing in its own program?
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  Engaging Communities for Climate Resilience Planning

  (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2024-04-25) Van Slooten, Alaina

  The field of climate resilience planning has emerged in response to the increased heat, wildfires, storms, and myriad other complex challenges towns and cities around the world are facing as a result of the climate crisis. This paper utilizes a broad definition of climate resilience, encompassing adaptation to changing environmental conditions, improving systems' ability to respond to social and environmental threats, and addressing causes of climate change. While large-scale federal and international action is crucial, climate change impacts will continue to play out among local communities of people around the world. Climate resilience planners and other practitioners will need to work with communities to better understand the threats they are facing and design interventions that provide local benefits. Because of the urgency and complexity of climate threats, as well as controversy surrounding interventions seen as green gentrification, engaging communities in climate resilience planning is uniquely challenging. This paper will examine community engagement practices in climate resilience planning, with an eye towards how they impact the implementation success of the final plan. The research question is, "what community engagement practices lead to climate resilience plans that achieve implementation steps?" First, the paper will review literature to outline the evolution of community engagement approaches and define climate resilience planning. Then, the two concepts are brought together to explore models of community engagement in climate-related planning, emerging challenges, and current guidance on best practices. Following the literature review, the paper will offer four case studies of climate resilience plans with strong community engagement. The case studies will delve into the “how” of community engagement processes with attention to equity and justice: who was engaged, at what stages in the process, and using what practices. To the extent possible using interviews and research, the case studies will connect community engagement to plan implementation: how was the plan received and progress made towards its actions and goals. Finally, this paper will identify common threads and challenges between the examples to develop actionable recommendations for climate resilience practitioners seeking to work among and in partnership with communities.
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  Calling A House a Home: The Interior and Exterior Design of Black Homes

  (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2024-04-25) McCain, Mary Jane

  This paper explores the interior and exterior design of Black homes as repositories for history, culture including personal identity and family history.
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  Task Modeling for Lunar Landing Redesignation

  (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2009-04) Chua, Zarrin K. ; Major, Laura M.

  Man's return to the Moon requires advancement in landing technology to achieve safe and precise landing. The Autonomous Landing and Hazard Avoidance Technology project is developing an autonomous flight manager (AFM) to provide the capability of assisting the crew during critical landing phases, beyond the standard guidance, navigation, and control. One such phase is landing point redesignation (LPR), where the crew must select a safe landing aim point. A task model is created to analyze the functions required for the LPR task, the allocation of functions between crew and automation, and the information needed by the crew. Three bottlenecks are found in the LPR task: the inability to rapidly compare alternative aim points, the time penalty associated with changing internal mission objectives, and the hindrance of communicating such a change to the AFM. The LPR task model predicts a task execution time of 25 seconds for the best scenario, but implies design changes are necessary to improve a task execution of 5 minutes in the worst scenario. Implementation of the changes suggested in this paper will reduce crew workload and stress during lunar landing, and increase overall system risk and reliability.
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  Ablative Thermal Response Analysis Using the Finite Element Method

  (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2009-01) Dec, John A. ; Braun, Robert D.

  A review of the classic techniques used to solve ablative thermal response problems is presented. The advantages and disadvantages of both the finite element and finite difference methods are described. As a first step in developing a three dimensional finite element based ablative thermal response capability, a one dimensional computer tool has been developed. The finite element method is used to discretize the governing differential equations and Galerkin's method of weighted residuals is used to derive the element equations. A code to code comparison between the current 1-D finite element tool and the 1-D Fully Implicit Ablation and Thermal response program (FIAT), a NASA-standard finite difference tool, has been performed.
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  Survivability and Resiliency of Spacecraft and Space-Based Networks: a Framework for Characterization and Analysis

  (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2008-09) Castet, Jean-Francois ; Saleh, Joseph H.

  Considerations of survivability and resiliency have always been of importance in the design and analysis of military systems. Over the past two decades, the importance of survivability and resiliency has expanded beyond military systems to include public networks and infrastructure systems. The analysis and assessment of networked systems with respect to survivability has become particularly acute in recent years, as attested to by a growing technical literature on the subject. In this paper, we bring these considerations of survivability and resiliency to bear on spacecraft and space-based networks. We develop a framework for comparing the survivability and resiliency of different space architectures, namely that of a monolithic design and a distributed (or networked) space system architecture. There are multiple metrics along which different space architectures can be benchmarked and compared. We argue that if survivability and resiliency are not accounted for, then the evaluation process is likely to be biased in favor of monolithic spacecraft. We show that if in a given context survivability and resiliency are an important requirement for a particular customer, then a distributed architecture is more likely to satisfy this requirement than a monolithic spacecraft design. We discuss in the context of our framework different classes of threats, as well as the high-frequency and low-frequency system response to (or coping strategies with) these shocks or damaging events. We illustrate the importance of this characterization for a formal definition of survivability and resiliency and a proper quantitative analysis of the subject. Finally, we propose in future work to integrate our framework with a design tool that allows the exploration of the design trade-space of distributed space architecture and show how survivability can be "optimized" or traded against other system attributes.
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  A Series of Unforeseen Events: The Space Shuttle Mission Evolution Flexibility

  (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2008-09) Lafleur, Jarret M. ; Saleh, Joseph H.

  A common objective in the design of a new space system is that of flexibility, or the capability to easily modify that system in the future in response to a changing environment or changing requirements. The focus of this paper is a case study of the U.S. Space Shuttle to glean some insight into fundamental characteristics of flexibility in human space systems and how this may be applied to future systems. Data is presented on the evolution of mission requirements over time for 120 missions performed by the Space Shuttle over a period of approximately 27 years. Distinct trends in the time domain - as well causes of these trends - are identified, and early manifest plans from 1982 serve as a confirmation that these trends were not originally anticipated. Eight examples are then presented of engineering modifications that allowed the Shuttle to adapt and accommodate these requirement changes. Conclusions are drawn on the nature of flexibility as experienced by the Space Shuttle. Finally, remaining questions are posed regarding how flexibility is considered in the initial stages of design for space systems.