Abstract: Last few years the hindrance, accidents, pollution and other negative side effects of construction projects and namely construction transport have become an issue particularly in urban areas across Europe such as in London, and in the Netherlands as well, including the cities of Utrecht, Rotterdam and Amsterdam. Municipalities have issued new legislation and stricter conditions for vehicles to be able to access cities and city centres in particular and accessibility of older and polluting vehicles. Considerate clients, public as well private, have started developing tender policies to encourage contractors to reduce the environmental impact of construction projects. Contractors and third party logistics providers have started applying consolidation centres. These developments have shown considerable reductions of number of vehicles needed to deliver goods and to transport workers to site. In addition these developments have led to increased transport efficiency, labour productivity and cost reductions on site as well as down the supply chain. Besides these developments have led to increased innovations in the field of logistics planning software, use of ICT , and handling hardware and equipment. This paper gives an overview of current developments and applications in the field of construction logistics in the Netherlands, and in a few project cases in particular. Those cases are underway as part of an ongoing applied research project and studied by using an ethnographic participative action research approach. The case findings and project results show initial advantages how the projects, the firms involved and the environment can profit from the advancement of logistics management leading to reduced environmental impact and increased efficiencies of construction transport.
Recently environmental education (EE) literature has been supportive of pluralistic rather than goal-oriented learning. Researchers argue that sustainability is not fixed but socially constructed and that sustainability issues should not be represented as indisputable targets. Countering this trend in environmental education research, this article argues that unsustainability should be treated as a concrete challenge that requires concrete solutions. The author will argue that there is a need for clear articulation of (1) what (un)sustainability is; (2) what are the key challenges of (un)sustainability; and (3) how the sustainability challenges can be meaningfully addressed. This article will outline a number of helpful frameworks that address obstacles to sustainability, ranging from population growth to unsustainable production and consumption practices. Solutions include investment in family planning to counter the effects of overpopulation, and alternative production frameworks, such as Cradle to Cradle that differs from the conventional frameworks. This article will conclude with the broader reflection that without goal-oriented critical learning explicitly providing sound models of sustainability, open learning may never permit transcendence from unsustainability. This article will develop a number of comprehensive frameworks targeted at solutions to sustainability issues both from ethical and practical perspectives. This is a post-peer-review, pre-copyedit version of an article published in "Environment, Development and Sustainability". The final authenticated version is available online at: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10668-014-9584-z https://www.linkedin.com/in/helenkopnina/
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OBJECTIVES: (1) To study the natural decline in functional capacity (FC) of healthy aging workers; (2) to compare FC to categories of workload; and (3) to study the differences in decline between men and women.DESIGN: Cross-sectional design.SETTING: A rehabilitation center at a university medical center.PARTICIPANTS: Volunteer sample of healthy workers (N=701) between 20 and 60 years of age, working at least 20 hours per week in the year prior to the study. Subjects were recruited via local press and personal networks.INTERVENTIONS: FC was measured with a 14-item Functional Capacity Evaluation. Demographics and health status were measured with a general demographic questionnaire and the RAND-36 questionnaire.MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Workload was expressed by the workload categories, as described by the Dictionary of Occupational Titles. Descriptive statistics were used to present FC of workers. Change in FC by age was tested with segmented regression analyses with a cutoff point at 45 years of age.RESULTS: Significant but small declines of FC under age 45 years were present in repetitive reaching, hand dexterity, and energetic capacity. Up to 45 years of age, hand and finger strength increased on average. Over 45 years of age, lifting, carrying, hand and finger strength, and coordinative tests declined more compared with the group aged less than 45 years. Work capacity of men and women working in sedentary and light work was sufficient in all age categories. There are no differences in decline between men and women.CONCLUSIONS: FC of healthy workers declines with age. This study demonstrates substantial variation in the type of FC decline among healthy workers between 20 and 60 years of age. Material handling, hand and finger strength, and hand coordination appear to decline the most in workers over age 45 years. The objective of rehabilitation is to maximize an individual's FC, particularly with respect to environmental demand. Thus, return to work programs must appreciate both FC and workplace demands in an effort to restore/enhance equilibrium between the 2.
