By 2020, it might be possible for 80 per cent of the passengers travelling through the world's international airports to only have to deal with machines, and not interact with human beings at all, as they pass through fully automated check-ins and immigration counters, aviation technology experts said in Dubai.
Speaking on optimizing technology to create SMART terminals of the future, on the concluding day of the Global Airport Leaders' Forum (GALF), Mr. Francesco Violante, Chief Executive Officer, SITA , said that this would reduce congestion in airports and dependence on labour and greatly improve the overall efficiency and time saving. "Imagine this technology which will also help airport operators to geo-locate you through your phone etc, and send you specific information that would be of interest to you, enabling you to go shopping for discount deals you want, collect your boarding card as you enter the aircraft, in short absolutely eliminate all the hassle that makes air travel so stressful right now," Mr. Violante suggested.
According to Mr. Hussein Dabbas, Vice President, Middle East and North Africa, IATA, such technology was now a reality thanks also to the huge investments in the airports infrastructure, which would have been difficult to imagine even a decade ago. He said: "Growth of passenger numbers has been phenomenal - by 2020 - almost 95 million passengers are expected to cross Dubai International airport and infrastructure needs to keep up. About 50 per cent people prefer using machines rather than checking-in and passing security check conventionally, according to real time Location system. Most people find processes at the airports to be the most troublesome part of their journey at present, he added. The governments are realizing what aviation brings in to the GDP - in the case of the UAE alone this is 15 per cent currently. They are realizing the importance of facilitation of passengers - countries realize today that creating hub airports like in Singapore or Dubai are a great asset, fuelling infrastructure growth elsewhere.
The airline industry, growing 6 to 8 per cent annually, requires countries that are forward-looking to invest heavily to keep themselves ahead of the competition and become SMART airports, Mr. Dabbas said. Jordan, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and several other countries are privatizing the airports operations, touting them as the service sectors. Mr. Thani Al Zaffin, Director General, Emaratech, said: "Dubai International Airport handled 55 million passengers in 2012, and is looking at 95 million in the year 2020. There is an expansion to Concourse 1 and 2 and Al Maktoum International is becoming operational for passengers in October this year. Everyone is now doing their part to ensure efficiency, and we hope that with the introduction of e-Gates in a big way, we will help facilitate the process even more." Mr. Dabbas sounded a note of caution about the obvious fallout of the rapid growth. "We should expect problems. There is huge congestion in the air. The planes circling over Dubai, especially going East from the UAE at peak hours, have to endure heavy congestion. Flights have to circle for 40 minutes waiting for a slot to take off. There is a need to look at the bigger picture and air traffic control has to step up," he said.
The Square Stand is made out of molded white plastic and swivels either to the merchant or to the customer. It bolts to a checkout counter or a cash register box and runs Square's point-of-sale application called Square Register. It comes equipped with a credit card reader and USB ports as well as a bar code scanner, receipt printer and rtls.
“When I was an undergrad at USC, taking my first developmental psychology class, I realized that the way they were characterizing different types of parents just didn’t seem to fit Asian American models,” says Kim. “They talked about authoritarian, authoritative, permissive and negligent parenting, and none of them seemed to really match the families I saw around me. And then I learned about the ‘achievement-adjustment paradox’: Among European American kids, you see that social and mental health goes hand in hand with academic success, but that’s not the case with Asian American kids. And I thought, there must be some kind of linkage with Asian parenting styles.”
As a doctoral student at the University of California at Davis, Kim decided to focus her research on parenting techniques of Asian American immigrants, and recruited over 400 Bay Area Chinese American households into a longitudinal research program — assessing the parenting of mothers and fathers on eight different dimensions, four positive and four negative, and tracking how these profiles evolved over the course of eight years, while also measuring the academic success and emotional health of their children.
The parents were ultimately divided into four categories. Those with low positive, high negative characteristics (essentially, cold and remote yet strict and controlling) were dubbed “Harsh”; those with high positive, low negative characteristics (warm, engaged and flexible) were dubbed “Supportive,” and those with low positive and low negative (distant and laissez-faire) were dubbed “Easygoing.”
Kim wasn’t sure what to call the final category, who scored high on both positive and negative characteristics — until Amy Chua’s 2011 book “Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother” was released, unleashing the controversy that continues to this day. Kim realized that the high positive-high negative profile mapped closely to the “Tiger Parent” persona, and decided to give the quadrant that name.
“As we reviewed the data, we were really surprised at what we found,” says Kim. “When we looked at mean GPA, the Supportive parents had kids that were substantially higher than any other group — including Tiger parents. In fact, by the end of our study, with the kids in high school, kids with Supportive parents had mean GPAs of 3.4, and kids with Tiger parents had 3.0. That’s a huge gap.”
2013年5月15日 星期三
Leaf unveils next-gen LeafPresenter Android POS tablet for taking payments
You're at a coffee shop or restaurant and it's time to pay for your sustenance. After reaching for your wallet, you're presented with... an Android tablet? This particular scenario is taking place more and more often as small businesses are taking their point-of-sale systems mobile, and Leaf is one of the big contenders battling for market share in this industry. Its signature product, known as the LeafPresenter, is an Android-based tablet with a funky lip on the top right that allows for mag-stripe credit card transactions. While the first-gen version of the device has been out for some time, Leaf is ready to branch out later this summer with a new model that offers more functionality.
In addition to a newer forked version of Android (Leaf OS), the upcoming LeafPresenter throws in NFC, EMV and gift card support, as well as a 2MP front-facing camera, 1,280x800 display and better battery. Last but not least, the new device also includes support for a Leaf-branded third-party app store geared toward small business usage. While there's no specific cost to the tablet itself, business owners will need to fork over $50 per month for the opportunity to use it. Check the press release after the break for hands free access.
Peter Thiel is known for his canny investments. He was the first outside investor in Facebook, and look how that turned out. So it is cause for excitement in British tech circles that the first European investment by Thiel’s Valar Ventures is in TransferWise, a London-based start-up that hopes to do for remittances what Skype did to long-distance dialling. That analogy is particularly apt because Taavet Hinrikus, a co-founder, was an early Skype employee. And Thiel knows his way around online money transfers; he co-founded PayPal.
Here’s how TransferWise works: Nikos, a Greek migrant in London, pays ￡100 pounds to the web-based service via his British bank or debit card and asks for it to be sent to Athens, where his brother lives. TransferWise’s algorithm finds someone in Greece, let’s call her Alexa, who wants to send money over to London. She’s put her funds in as well. TransferWise takes the cash out of its own British holdings and sends it to Nikos’s bank account. Its arm in Greece does the same for Alexa. Presto: everybody’s got their remittance and the involvement of banks remained strictly domestic.
The beauty of TransferWise is that it almost entirely bypasses banks, which use every opportunity to wring out every last cent from overseas transfers. While it is relatively easy to move money within the EU—the key word being relatively—getting it over more consequential borders can be expensive and time-consuming. Banks charge hefty fees, convert at rates favorable to themselves, and tend to ask questions.
The service differs from Western Union in two ways: it relies on other people’s money to build its corpus rather than its own, and it is significantly cheaper: a ridiculously low ￡1 or €1 for payments up to 200 in either currency. Fees go slightly higher for bigger sums and become more complicated with other currencies. Still, it transferred ￡10 million ($16 million) in 2011, its first year of operation, and a cumulative ￡125 million as of today, which TransferWise says saved its customers ￡5 million in fees.
The same two elements are what make TransferWise so similar to hawala, a system of money transfer used throughout the Islamic world, including South Asia. Hawala operators have a network of agents across the region in which they function. A customer—call him Ahmed—goes to a hawala agent in Dubai and asks him to send 10,000 rupees to Karachi. A quick phone call later, the designated consignee in Karachi, Faiz, can visit his own agent and pick up the equivalent in dirhams, minus a small fee.
How does the Karachi agent know whom to give it to in the absence of computers and log-ins and algorithms and such? There are many ways, including verbal passwords, but one of the most elegant is the banknote system. Ahmed calls his friend Faiz and asks him to fetch a 10 rupee note. Faiz reads out the serial number on the note to Ahmed, who tells his agent in Dubai, who in turn passes the information to Karachi. The Karachi agent will only hand over the money to somebody carrying the very same 10-rupee note.
TransferWise and hawala are simple and smart ways of getting money across borders without the hassles of dealing with banks’ labyrinthine rules and fees. But there is one significant difference. Hawala has no written records and is based entirely on community ties and personal trust. TransferWise on the other hand logs details of its customers and adheres to regulations. Its biggest problem at the moment is scale—the system is hard to make work when certain countries, such as Haiti or the Philippines, receive far more than they send. That, presumably, is what the $6 million round of funding led by Thiel will help solve. The only question is how TransferWise’s American backers will send over the rtls.
In addition to a newer forked version of Android (Leaf OS), the upcoming LeafPresenter throws in NFC, EMV and gift card support, as well as a 2MP front-facing camera, 1,280x800 display and better battery. Last but not least, the new device also includes support for a Leaf-branded third-party app store geared toward small business usage. While there's no specific cost to the tablet itself, business owners will need to fork over $50 per month for the opportunity to use it. Check the press release after the break for hands free access.
Peter Thiel is known for his canny investments. He was the first outside investor in Facebook, and look how that turned out. So it is cause for excitement in British tech circles that the first European investment by Thiel’s Valar Ventures is in TransferWise, a London-based start-up that hopes to do for remittances what Skype did to long-distance dialling. That analogy is particularly apt because Taavet Hinrikus, a co-founder, was an early Skype employee. And Thiel knows his way around online money transfers; he co-founded PayPal.
Here’s how TransferWise works: Nikos, a Greek migrant in London, pays ￡100 pounds to the web-based service via his British bank or debit card and asks for it to be sent to Athens, where his brother lives. TransferWise’s algorithm finds someone in Greece, let’s call her Alexa, who wants to send money over to London. She’s put her funds in as well. TransferWise takes the cash out of its own British holdings and sends it to Nikos’s bank account. Its arm in Greece does the same for Alexa. Presto: everybody’s got their remittance and the involvement of banks remained strictly domestic.
The beauty of TransferWise is that it almost entirely bypasses banks, which use every opportunity to wring out every last cent from overseas transfers. While it is relatively easy to move money within the EU—the key word being relatively—getting it over more consequential borders can be expensive and time-consuming. Banks charge hefty fees, convert at rates favorable to themselves, and tend to ask questions.
The service differs from Western Union in two ways: it relies on other people’s money to build its corpus rather than its own, and it is significantly cheaper: a ridiculously low ￡1 or €1 for payments up to 200 in either currency. Fees go slightly higher for bigger sums and become more complicated with other currencies. Still, it transferred ￡10 million ($16 million) in 2011, its first year of operation, and a cumulative ￡125 million as of today, which TransferWise says saved its customers ￡5 million in fees.
The same two elements are what make TransferWise so similar to hawala, a system of money transfer used throughout the Islamic world, including South Asia. Hawala operators have a network of agents across the region in which they function. A customer—call him Ahmed—goes to a hawala agent in Dubai and asks him to send 10,000 rupees to Karachi. A quick phone call later, the designated consignee in Karachi, Faiz, can visit his own agent and pick up the equivalent in dirhams, minus a small fee.
How does the Karachi agent know whom to give it to in the absence of computers and log-ins and algorithms and such? There are many ways, including verbal passwords, but one of the most elegant is the banknote system. Ahmed calls his friend Faiz and asks him to fetch a 10 rupee note. Faiz reads out the serial number on the note to Ahmed, who tells his agent in Dubai, who in turn passes the information to Karachi. The Karachi agent will only hand over the money to somebody carrying the very same 10-rupee note.
TransferWise and hawala are simple and smart ways of getting money across borders without the hassles of dealing with banks’ labyrinthine rules and fees. But there is one significant difference. Hawala has no written records and is based entirely on community ties and personal trust. TransferWise on the other hand logs details of its customers and adheres to regulations. Its biggest problem at the moment is scale—the system is hard to make work when certain countries, such as Haiti or the Philippines, receive far more than they send. That, presumably, is what the $6 million round of funding led by Thiel will help solve. The only question is how TransferWise’s American backers will send over the rtls.
2013年5月3日 星期五
Derksen takes two-shot lead after opening round in China
China’s Ye Wo-cheng had to settle for a round of 79 as he became the youngest player in tour history at the age of 12 years and 242 days, but 16-year-old compatriot Dou Ze-cheng carded a two-under-par 70 at Binhai Lake Golf Club in Tianjin.
And Derksen, without a win since 2005, then birdied two of the last three holes to card a six-under 66 and finish two ahead of France’s Raphael Jacquelin, Thailand’s Kiradech Aphibarnrat and rtls.
Rumford won the Ballantine’s Championship in Korea on Sunday with an eagle three on the first hole of a three-man play-off, while Jacquelin won the Spanish Open a fortnight ago after a record-equalling nine-hole play-off.
Aphibarnrat finished fourth in the Avantha Masters in India, won the Malaysian Open the following week and then finished 11th behind Rumford at Blackstone Golf Club last week.
In contrast, Ye carded eight bogeys and just one birdie to lie 140th on seven over, but did produce one of the shots of the day when he holed a long chip for a bogey six on the sixth after losing a ball on the par-five.
“I tried to enjoy it, I was very nervous,” Ye told European Tour Radio after surpassing the record set by Guan Tianlang, who famously made the cut at the Masters last month aged 14 and was 13 years and 177 days old when he played in the same event last year.
Dou, who like Ye earnt his place in the field after coming through qualifying events, had four birdies and two bogeys in his round of 70 and said: “I started a little nervous but it was all pretty good. It was great out there.
“We were lucky to play seven or eight holes without much wind. The course gives you a few birdie chances, but there were some holes — like the fourth, ninth and 17th — which were playing really long into the wind.”
Derksen, who was one over par after five holes, said: “It was a funny day because I started well with a birdie from about five feet but then three-putted the third and fourth and ended up in three divots on the fairways later in the round.
That said, Carty and Jazayerli both found via a more complicated method factoring the past three seasons’ records — relevant here given the downtrodden nature of the Kansas City franchise — that it wasn’t until the 48-game mark when the current record became more predictive than a preseason expectation, based upon a weighted three-year record (35 percent for the previous year, 12 percent for two years ago, five percent for three years ago and 48 percent for .500, for the strong tendency of teams to regress to the mean). In light of that, the Royals are only about halfway to the point where they can be taken seriously as contenders.
Even so, their results so far are encouraging, particularly with regards to the rotation makeover in which they added James Shields, Ervin Santana and Wade Davis via trade, and re-signed late-season acquisition Jeremy Guthrie, leaving Luis Mendoza the only holdover. Their starters’ collective 3.85 ERA ranks fifth in the league, and their 56 percent quality start rate is fourth. Shields, Santana and Guthrie all have ERAs of 3.06 or below, though the latter’s 5.06 FIP — driven by a high home run rate — offers more cause for concern. In fact, the three besides Shields and Santana have FIPs of 4.96 or higher due mainly to their problems keeping the ball in the park.
As with last year, the team’s biggest strength appears to be its bullpen, which currently ranks second in the AL with a 2.67 ERA, and in a virtual tie for first at 10.6 strikeouts per nine, though their 33 percent rate of allowing inherited runners to score ranks 11th. Closer Greg Holland, who took over the job late last year after Jonathan Broxton was traded, has converted seven out of eight opportunities while striking out an eye-popping 16.4 per nine. Of their top six relievers in terms of usage, five (Holland, Kelvim Herrera, Tim Collins, Luke Hochevar and Bruce Chen) are striking out more than a batter per inning with a strikeout-to-walk ratio of at least 3.0. Banished from the rotation after ugly performances last year, Hochever and Chen have combined to allow three runs (one earned) in 18 1/3 innings while striking out 22 thus far, offering hope that they can give Kansas City something for the combined $9.1 million they’re being paid this year.
One of the latest threats against travelers is invisible and silent: wireless attacks that siphon your credit card number, personal information and passwords. Anything with a radio-frequency identification (RFID) chip, including your passport or a credit card, can be read from afar. Thieves can also mine valuable data from your smartphone when it automatically logs on to a WiFi network.
Fortunately, there are a few simple ways to thwart these wireless assaults, including new luggage products and common-sense steps that protect your devices and real time Location system.
As it turned out, Tzucker’s card didn’t have an RFID chip. And she was lucky. Before the cigar-loving thieves could finish their shopping excursion, her bank’s fraud detection algorithm tagged her purchases as suspicious, disabled her account and refunded the fraudulent transactions. And that may be one of the most effective solutions — having a bank that can stop fraud quickly and cover any losses. After the incident, Tzucker also switched to using a prepaid debit card when she traveled, which contains no personal information.
But others haven’t been so fortunate. Nearly half of all travelers use their smartphones to access the Internet when they’re on vacation, according to a recent survey by security firm Kaspersky Lab. One-third of phone users store their passwords to online accounts, including bank and social networks, on their devices. While any phone can be a target, the most vulnerable wireless devices run on the Android operating system, according to Kaspersky.
And Derksen, without a win since 2005, then birdied two of the last three holes to card a six-under 66 and finish two ahead of France’s Raphael Jacquelin, Thailand’s Kiradech Aphibarnrat and rtls.
Rumford won the Ballantine’s Championship in Korea on Sunday with an eagle three on the first hole of a three-man play-off, while Jacquelin won the Spanish Open a fortnight ago after a record-equalling nine-hole play-off.
Aphibarnrat finished fourth in the Avantha Masters in India, won the Malaysian Open the following week and then finished 11th behind Rumford at Blackstone Golf Club last week.
In contrast, Ye carded eight bogeys and just one birdie to lie 140th on seven over, but did produce one of the shots of the day when he holed a long chip for a bogey six on the sixth after losing a ball on the par-five.
“I tried to enjoy it, I was very nervous,” Ye told European Tour Radio after surpassing the record set by Guan Tianlang, who famously made the cut at the Masters last month aged 14 and was 13 years and 177 days old when he played in the same event last year.
Dou, who like Ye earnt his place in the field after coming through qualifying events, had four birdies and two bogeys in his round of 70 and said: “I started a little nervous but it was all pretty good. It was great out there.
“We were lucky to play seven or eight holes without much wind. The course gives you a few birdie chances, but there were some holes — like the fourth, ninth and 17th — which were playing really long into the wind.”
Derksen, who was one over par after five holes, said: “It was a funny day because I started well with a birdie from about five feet but then three-putted the third and fourth and ended up in three divots on the fairways later in the round.
That said, Carty and Jazayerli both found via a more complicated method factoring the past three seasons’ records — relevant here given the downtrodden nature of the Kansas City franchise — that it wasn’t until the 48-game mark when the current record became more predictive than a preseason expectation, based upon a weighted three-year record (35 percent for the previous year, 12 percent for two years ago, five percent for three years ago and 48 percent for .500, for the strong tendency of teams to regress to the mean). In light of that, the Royals are only about halfway to the point where they can be taken seriously as contenders.
Even so, their results so far are encouraging, particularly with regards to the rotation makeover in which they added James Shields, Ervin Santana and Wade Davis via trade, and re-signed late-season acquisition Jeremy Guthrie, leaving Luis Mendoza the only holdover. Their starters’ collective 3.85 ERA ranks fifth in the league, and their 56 percent quality start rate is fourth. Shields, Santana and Guthrie all have ERAs of 3.06 or below, though the latter’s 5.06 FIP — driven by a high home run rate — offers more cause for concern. In fact, the three besides Shields and Santana have FIPs of 4.96 or higher due mainly to their problems keeping the ball in the park.
As with last year, the team’s biggest strength appears to be its bullpen, which currently ranks second in the AL with a 2.67 ERA, and in a virtual tie for first at 10.6 strikeouts per nine, though their 33 percent rate of allowing inherited runners to score ranks 11th. Closer Greg Holland, who took over the job late last year after Jonathan Broxton was traded, has converted seven out of eight opportunities while striking out an eye-popping 16.4 per nine. Of their top six relievers in terms of usage, five (Holland, Kelvim Herrera, Tim Collins, Luke Hochevar and Bruce Chen) are striking out more than a batter per inning with a strikeout-to-walk ratio of at least 3.0. Banished from the rotation after ugly performances last year, Hochever and Chen have combined to allow three runs (one earned) in 18 1/3 innings while striking out 22 thus far, offering hope that they can give Kansas City something for the combined $9.1 million they’re being paid this year.
One of the latest threats against travelers is invisible and silent: wireless attacks that siphon your credit card number, personal information and passwords. Anything with a radio-frequency identification (RFID) chip, including your passport or a credit card, can be read from afar. Thieves can also mine valuable data from your smartphone when it automatically logs on to a WiFi network.
Fortunately, there are a few simple ways to thwart these wireless assaults, including new luggage products and common-sense steps that protect your devices and real time Location system.
As it turned out, Tzucker’s card didn’t have an RFID chip. And she was lucky. Before the cigar-loving thieves could finish their shopping excursion, her bank’s fraud detection algorithm tagged her purchases as suspicious, disabled her account and refunded the fraudulent transactions. And that may be one of the most effective solutions — having a bank that can stop fraud quickly and cover any losses. After the incident, Tzucker also switched to using a prepaid debit card when she traveled, which contains no personal information.
But others haven’t been so fortunate. Nearly half of all travelers use their smartphones to access the Internet when they’re on vacation, according to a recent survey by security firm Kaspersky Lab. One-third of phone users store their passwords to online accounts, including bank and social networks, on their devices. While any phone can be a target, the most vulnerable wireless devices run on the Android operating system, according to Kaspersky.
Upgrading Eugene’s Old Schools
Eugene’s School District 4J has many school buildings that date to the post-war era of the 1940s and ’50s and some elementary schools have 40 doors to the outside, a security concern. Most of these cheaply built older schools would not stand in a major earthquake and some, like River Road Elementary, have such inadequate ventilation that teachers sometimes evacuate their students when air quality monitors warn of bad air.
Measure 20-210 on the May 21 ballot would authorize the district to sell $170 million in bonds to replace four old school buildings, renovate other buildings, improve technology and instructional materials, upgrade security, buy new buses and make other improvements. No organized opposition to the measure has appeared so far.
The estimated cost to the median homeowner (assessed value of $174,000) would be 24 cents per $1,000 in value or about $42 a year. The new total of bonded debt repayment would rise to $1.60 per $1,000 until 2017 when an earlier bond will be paid off. At that time, voters may see another bond measure on the ballot since school facility upgrading is a long-term process and four more schools, including North Eugene High School, are on the list for replacement or hands free access.
“The measure allows for smart repairs to some of the really older buildings in the district that will save money in the long run and allow more money to be spent in the classroom,” 4J School Board Chair Jennifer Geller says. “It will fund technology improvements in every school in the district.”
Geller says about 40 percent of computers in the district don’t run current software. The measure will also update instructional materials for every school: new math, new writing curricula and new science equipment at the secondary level. And it will improve school security with key card access and video surveillance.
Four of the “most dilapidated schools in the district” will be replaced, Geller says: Roosevelt and Jefferson middle schools and Howard and River Road elementary schools. The gymnasiums at Jefferson will be saved. Renovations are also planned for Gilham Elementary and Kelly Middle School. The architecturally and culturally significant 87-year-old brick Edison Elementary School will be saved for now, despite its problems. Roosevelt has a large site that will likely be rebuilt where the tennis courts are currently, rather than at the Civic Stadium site.
School bonding was restricted by the Oregon Constitution to be only for new construction, but in 2010 voters approved Measure 68, allowing capital bonding for renovations, repairs and other needs. Measure 5 and other tax-restricting laws have made it difficult for school districts to raise additional money for staffing and reducing class sizes. But bonding is not restricted like property taxes.
“This is one of the only ways we can get money into this district,” says Laura Illig, chair of the Yes for 4J Schools campaign. Bonding is “really significant for our district because we have some investments we need to make and there is no money in the general fund, things like science curriculum and equipment,” she says. “We’ve been putting off replacing buses and making general repairs, and without bond funding those things would come out of the general fund.”
No dollar amount has been calculated on what the district will save with this new investment in capital improvements, but Geller and Illig figure the savings will be significant over time. The new and remodeled buildings will be more energy efficient and general funds will not be needed to cover technology and curriculum updates, new buses and general repairs. And by not delaying construction projects, the district can take advantage of low bond interest rates and the currently lower costs for materials and labor.
The cashier handed a gentleman his credit card after he swiped his $8 total for two. As he and his friend take a seat, the customer behind him asks the cashier where she could scan her mobile rewards application. The cashier points to the glowing 10-inch tablet off to the side; the customer aligns her smartphone to a colorful barcode on the tablet. Her $9 drink total for her and her kids magically changes to a $4.50 value.
At this point, the first customer is probably thinking his wallet is suddenly feeling tremendously lighter as he looks down at his iPhone 4s, heavy with regret. What did that customer just scan? How did she get such a terrific deal?
What may seem like another random mobile app was actually the solution behind a digital customer loyalty rewards system that has revolutionized the relationship between merchants and customers. These solutions are better known as startup mobile apps like Pirq and Bellycard.
Dividing the responsibility of customer frequency between the merchant and mobile startups makes for a win-win situation. While restaurant owners benefit from customer loyalty when users redeem 25% or 50% off their meals, mobile apps such as these conquer the future of digital reward systems. These reward programs are changing the way customers are interacting with their favorite retail and restaurant merchants by increasing business indoor positioning system and utilizing public deals.
What is unique about Bellycard is that they customize their rewards in fun and unique ways depending on the merchant. For example, “You can arm wrestle a sandwich restaurant owner or ride along in a food truck that will let its best customers “egg” the truck as it drives by” as stated by Leena Rao at Techcrunch.
Pirq and Bellycard differ from sites like Groupon and Living Social because they spend less time focusing on customer loyalty and more time on finding the best ‘bang-for-your-buck’.
“Groupon does mass-market push with their emails but they crush your business because tons of people come in during the same hours and only one cashier is there to manage it,” said Kaitlin Sandblom, Pirq’s Marketing and Public Relations Coordinator.
When asked what could be improved with customer loyalty apps, Christine Ngo, Pirq user and junior at the University of Washington, said that she wished they would implement push notifications.
Measure 20-210 on the May 21 ballot would authorize the district to sell $170 million in bonds to replace four old school buildings, renovate other buildings, improve technology and instructional materials, upgrade security, buy new buses and make other improvements. No organized opposition to the measure has appeared so far.
The estimated cost to the median homeowner (assessed value of $174,000) would be 24 cents per $1,000 in value or about $42 a year. The new total of bonded debt repayment would rise to $1.60 per $1,000 until 2017 when an earlier bond will be paid off. At that time, voters may see another bond measure on the ballot since school facility upgrading is a long-term process and four more schools, including North Eugene High School, are on the list for replacement or hands free access.
“The measure allows for smart repairs to some of the really older buildings in the district that will save money in the long run and allow more money to be spent in the classroom,” 4J School Board Chair Jennifer Geller says. “It will fund technology improvements in every school in the district.”
Geller says about 40 percent of computers in the district don’t run current software. The measure will also update instructional materials for every school: new math, new writing curricula and new science equipment at the secondary level. And it will improve school security with key card access and video surveillance.
Four of the “most dilapidated schools in the district” will be replaced, Geller says: Roosevelt and Jefferson middle schools and Howard and River Road elementary schools. The gymnasiums at Jefferson will be saved. Renovations are also planned for Gilham Elementary and Kelly Middle School. The architecturally and culturally significant 87-year-old brick Edison Elementary School will be saved for now, despite its problems. Roosevelt has a large site that will likely be rebuilt where the tennis courts are currently, rather than at the Civic Stadium site.
School bonding was restricted by the Oregon Constitution to be only for new construction, but in 2010 voters approved Measure 68, allowing capital bonding for renovations, repairs and other needs. Measure 5 and other tax-restricting laws have made it difficult for school districts to raise additional money for staffing and reducing class sizes. But bonding is not restricted like property taxes.
“This is one of the only ways we can get money into this district,” says Laura Illig, chair of the Yes for 4J Schools campaign. Bonding is “really significant for our district because we have some investments we need to make and there is no money in the general fund, things like science curriculum and equipment,” she says. “We’ve been putting off replacing buses and making general repairs, and without bond funding those things would come out of the general fund.”
No dollar amount has been calculated on what the district will save with this new investment in capital improvements, but Geller and Illig figure the savings will be significant over time. The new and remodeled buildings will be more energy efficient and general funds will not be needed to cover technology and curriculum updates, new buses and general repairs. And by not delaying construction projects, the district can take advantage of low bond interest rates and the currently lower costs for materials and labor.
The cashier handed a gentleman his credit card after he swiped his $8 total for two. As he and his friend take a seat, the customer behind him asks the cashier where she could scan her mobile rewards application. The cashier points to the glowing 10-inch tablet off to the side; the customer aligns her smartphone to a colorful barcode on the tablet. Her $9 drink total for her and her kids magically changes to a $4.50 value.
At this point, the first customer is probably thinking his wallet is suddenly feeling tremendously lighter as he looks down at his iPhone 4s, heavy with regret. What did that customer just scan? How did she get such a terrific deal?
What may seem like another random mobile app was actually the solution behind a digital customer loyalty rewards system that has revolutionized the relationship between merchants and customers. These solutions are better known as startup mobile apps like Pirq and Bellycard.
Dividing the responsibility of customer frequency between the merchant and mobile startups makes for a win-win situation. While restaurant owners benefit from customer loyalty when users redeem 25% or 50% off their meals, mobile apps such as these conquer the future of digital reward systems. These reward programs are changing the way customers are interacting with their favorite retail and restaurant merchants by increasing business indoor positioning system and utilizing public deals.
What is unique about Bellycard is that they customize their rewards in fun and unique ways depending on the merchant. For example, “You can arm wrestle a sandwich restaurant owner or ride along in a food truck that will let its best customers “egg” the truck as it drives by” as stated by Leena Rao at Techcrunch.
Pirq and Bellycard differ from sites like Groupon and Living Social because they spend less time focusing on customer loyalty and more time on finding the best ‘bang-for-your-buck’.
“Groupon does mass-market push with their emails but they crush your business because tons of people come in during the same hours and only one cashier is there to manage it,” said Kaitlin Sandblom, Pirq’s Marketing and Public Relations Coordinator.
When asked what could be improved with customer loyalty apps, Christine Ngo, Pirq user and junior at the University of Washington, said that she wished they would implement push notifications.
2013年4月11日 星期四
How businesses can avoid the not so great "Recycling Con Trick"
The Daily Mail's increasingly vociferous campaign against the green economy opened up another front last Saturday with a front page splash purportedly uncovering the "Great Recycling Con Trick". Much to the consternation of many in the waste management and recycling rtls, the paper alleged that "millions of tons of household rubbish painstakingly sorted by families for recycling is being dumped abroad", although it unsurprisingly declined to provide any figures to back up its allegations.
Instead it simply stitched together a few quotes from the Campaign for Weekly Waste Collections and extracted a couple of lines from two Defra consultation documents that acknowledge the difficulty of assessing what happens to the 12 million tons of material that is exported each year for recycling overseas.
Seem too good to be true? Well, it may soon become a reality in a store near you thanks to four college students from Carnegie Mellon University.
Co-Founder Brian Groudan said the idea began with him and his three peers wanting to "consolidate all of the cards in your wallet."
"You carry around these slabs of plastic everyday," Groudan says. "The idea sort of evolved into 'hey, why do you need those cards at all?'" The foursome then built the prototype in 48 hours at a hackathon event and PayTango was born.
PayTango is a fingerprint-based identification and payment system. Signing up begins by scanning an index and middle finger, swiping your card through the reader to associate it with your fingerprint, and then punching in your phone number to finalize your account (the phone number is gathered in case you need to be contacted).
Once registered, wallets won't be needed. Shoppers can make any purchases with their fingerprints.
The team initially tested it in their CMU cafeteria with 100 students. Now, the service expanded to three dining locations on the campus. Groudan says their current focus in the next few months are college campuses but insists that's only the beginning, adding that the possibilities are "endless".
"I think the applications extend way beyond that," Groudan says. "Once you have the profile think about transportation not having to fumble with the coins, to pay for parking you just touch the meter, or when you're at the hospital and pull up your medical records."
The owner of the textile factory that produced them closed down and left Egypt soon after the country’s 2011 revolution. Assad Attiya, a clerk who has worked at the store for 13 years, said the former factory owner, like himself, is Christian.
“The owner is afraid to come back. It is harder here now and we want to leave,” explained Attiya, 48, from behind an almost barren counter he said once had been “lined with beautiful linens.”
By some estimates, tens of thousands of Christians have left post-revolution Egypt. Like the former textile maker, they have left due to concerns over rising Muslim conservatism and a general instability they say is emboldening attacks against them.
Perhaps the most dramatic example of sectarian tension yet occurred Sunday in central Cairo, where a crowd attacked Christian mourners after they emerged from a funeral in Egypt’s main Coptic Christian cathedral. The funeral was for four men killed in a Cairo gunfight Friday, in which a Muslim man also was killed. Some of the mourners, joined by sympathetic Muslims, filed out of St. Mark’s Cathedral shouting exhortations against Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi and his largely Islamic government.
The crowd responded to the demonstrators with rocks and gasoline bombs. Police eventually moved in, but numerous and independent news agencies reported police appeared to take the side of crowd, firing tear-gas canisters into the St. Mark’s courtyard and taking no action to stop the attacks on the Christians and their real time Location system.
Attiya, the fabric-story clerk, said he had applied the last two years for U.S. residency — a green card — through a lottery system that Washington sponsors, but wasn’t selected. A few months ago, he requested a tourist visa to visit his brother who works in an amusement park in New York, but was denied.
“All Egyptians, by nature, are kind (but) circumstances are now making everything bad, so I am afraid of you and you are afraid of me. And because of the fear within you, you become bad,” Attiya said.
“We all hoped for the best, but no one knows now what will happen,” he said, reflecting his disappointment over how the revolution, which united thousands of Muslims and Christians alike, has transpired.
Egyptians, including thousands of Muslims, now opposed to the Muslim Brotherhood government demonstrate and strike almost daily. The country’s military and other security forces have been at odds with the new government, and at times have withdrawn completely from different cities around the country.
The resulting state of instability, decaying economy and rise in crime have scared many Egyptians into leaving, or trying to — not least of all Egyptian Christians who say they are easy targets when trouble erupts and there is no system in place to protect them.
Instead it simply stitched together a few quotes from the Campaign for Weekly Waste Collections and extracted a couple of lines from two Defra consultation documents that acknowledge the difficulty of assessing what happens to the 12 million tons of material that is exported each year for recycling overseas.
Seem too good to be true? Well, it may soon become a reality in a store near you thanks to four college students from Carnegie Mellon University.
Co-Founder Brian Groudan said the idea began with him and his three peers wanting to "consolidate all of the cards in your wallet."
"You carry around these slabs of plastic everyday," Groudan says. "The idea sort of evolved into 'hey, why do you need those cards at all?'" The foursome then built the prototype in 48 hours at a hackathon event and PayTango was born.
PayTango is a fingerprint-based identification and payment system. Signing up begins by scanning an index and middle finger, swiping your card through the reader to associate it with your fingerprint, and then punching in your phone number to finalize your account (the phone number is gathered in case you need to be contacted).
Once registered, wallets won't be needed. Shoppers can make any purchases with their fingerprints.
The team initially tested it in their CMU cafeteria with 100 students. Now, the service expanded to three dining locations on the campus. Groudan says their current focus in the next few months are college campuses but insists that's only the beginning, adding that the possibilities are "endless".
"I think the applications extend way beyond that," Groudan says. "Once you have the profile think about transportation not having to fumble with the coins, to pay for parking you just touch the meter, or when you're at the hospital and pull up your medical records."
The owner of the textile factory that produced them closed down and left Egypt soon after the country’s 2011 revolution. Assad Attiya, a clerk who has worked at the store for 13 years, said the former factory owner, like himself, is Christian.
“The owner is afraid to come back. It is harder here now and we want to leave,” explained Attiya, 48, from behind an almost barren counter he said once had been “lined with beautiful linens.”
By some estimates, tens of thousands of Christians have left post-revolution Egypt. Like the former textile maker, they have left due to concerns over rising Muslim conservatism and a general instability they say is emboldening attacks against them.
Perhaps the most dramatic example of sectarian tension yet occurred Sunday in central Cairo, where a crowd attacked Christian mourners after they emerged from a funeral in Egypt’s main Coptic Christian cathedral. The funeral was for four men killed in a Cairo gunfight Friday, in which a Muslim man also was killed. Some of the mourners, joined by sympathetic Muslims, filed out of St. Mark’s Cathedral shouting exhortations against Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi and his largely Islamic government.
The crowd responded to the demonstrators with rocks and gasoline bombs. Police eventually moved in, but numerous and independent news agencies reported police appeared to take the side of crowd, firing tear-gas canisters into the St. Mark’s courtyard and taking no action to stop the attacks on the Christians and their real time Location system.
Attiya, the fabric-story clerk, said he had applied the last two years for U.S. residency — a green card — through a lottery system that Washington sponsors, but wasn’t selected. A few months ago, he requested a tourist visa to visit his brother who works in an amusement park in New York, but was denied.
“All Egyptians, by nature, are kind (but) circumstances are now making everything bad, so I am afraid of you and you are afraid of me. And because of the fear within you, you become bad,” Attiya said.
“We all hoped for the best, but no one knows now what will happen,” he said, reflecting his disappointment over how the revolution, which united thousands of Muslims and Christians alike, has transpired.
Egyptians, including thousands of Muslims, now opposed to the Muslim Brotherhood government demonstrate and strike almost daily. The country’s military and other security forces have been at odds with the new government, and at times have withdrawn completely from different cities around the country.
The resulting state of instability, decaying economy and rise in crime have scared many Egyptians into leaving, or trying to — not least of all Egyptian Christians who say they are easy targets when trouble erupts and there is no system in place to protect them.
Is Bitcoin the future of our money?
Bitcoins are back in business. Two years after the Bitcoin bubble had been called, the digital currency created by coders for coders is in the news again, as it surges to record highs. And with reason: Since the beginning of this year the value of this “new money” has risen exponentially. Just this week, the price of a Bitcoin rose from $142 on Monday to a jaw-popping $235 on the biggest Bitcoin exchange, Hands free access.
Of course we know it is a bubble, an algorithmic bubble if you will. But with its market valuation approaching $1.75 billion and rising, it’s a bubble with a future. The four-year-old currency, money built for the Internet, unlike cards and bank transfers that are being adapted for the Net, points to future where digital money will be the norm.
That’s because the digital crypto currency, whose origins are still shrouded in mystery (it is believed that it was created by a group of programmers who worked under the name Satoshi Nakamoto), has crucial properties that make it exceedingly attractive as an alternate currency. It is inflation resistant because it is free from government and banks manipulation and for some Russian tycoons the fact that it can’t be suddenly seized is another.
The quest for “new money” has been on for nearly three decades now ever since January 1980 when the final rites on the dollar were first read. In the alternate space there have been experiments, most currently Facebook credits, Linden dollars in 2nd Life or the QQ coins in China, which have served as currency in limited ways.
But the Bitcoin is another thing altogether. Possessing the twin facets of demand and liquidity, it can shrug off the underlying weakness of lacking a basis for its value. The 21 million Bitcoins limit built into it ensures its scarcity.
Debate right now is centered around whether the Bitcoin is a bubble. Most money managers have written it off. Nouriel Roubini, a bubbler-buster if ever there was one, tweeted recently, “Gold-bug suckers found another irrational useless bubble fad, the Bitcoin, the bubble flavour of the day. So they are dissin gold 4 Bitcoin”. And the extreme volatility of Bitcoin lends credence to the scepticism. Over the last 12 days the virtual currency has doubled its value.
But to write it off is both premature and short-sighted. Premature because a digital currency was waiting to happen and if not Bitcoin, another will replace it if it does go down. And short sighted because the history of money tells us that the momentum to a new form of currency starts building slowly, but eventually it can’t be halted.
The big charge against Bitcoin, that its value swings wildly depending on people’s faith in it, can as easily be levelled against derivatives. Nor is a currency that operates outside the pale of governments new to us in India where black money is equally institutionalized. Even overseas, on a rough estimate there is $300 trillion stashed away in offshore havens, well outside the purview of central banks and regulators.
The disbelief that Bitcoin or its equivalent could be the future of money isn’t new. The move to plastic was surrounded with equal scepticism. Starting with Diners in 1950, it took eight years for the next credit cards to appear in the market. And it wasn’t until the 1980s that credit cards became a particularly profitable business. But of course by 2006 credit card payments had overtaken cash or cheques for payments.
Most bubbles have a habit of creating something new, distinctly unbubble-like. Even if Bitcoins go under, the era of a pure digital currency which doesn’t have its antecedents in the physical world, is here. Frauds, inflation, Cyprus, have all ensured that the process of disintermediation in the money trial has begun. If it is sites selling porn, drugs and escort services today, it may well be bars tomorrow. Oh wait, that’s already happened. EVR, a bar in New York has started accepting Bitcoins for indoor Tracking.
Going straight to the point, the handset's sound quality is great. The loudspeaker is indeed loud. Apart from the default music player, the phone comes with Nokia Music. It's better to opt for the latter since it offers equaliser settings and Dolby enhancement. Moreover, it offers unlimited free track downloads for a year. The bundled earphones are just ok, but not in the same league as Samsung, who ship much better IEMs with its phones.
Like every other WP8 device, this one also lacks FM radio. According to Nokia's official blog though, the Snapdragon S4 chipset consists of a radio receiver, so a future update might enable this feature. Coming to the subject of video playback, the phone is compatible with MP4, WMV, and AVI videos up to 720p resolution. However, MKV videos are still a no-go.
The 5 megapixel snapper is surprisingly good. The resulting pictures contain incredible amount of details for a budget phone. More importantly, the colours look natural. Click here, to download the untouched sample. Similar to the high-end Lumia 920, this one packs in Nokia-exclusive lenses such as Cinemagraph, Smart shoot, and Panorama. To find out the usage of these camera plugins, go through our detailed article about Nokia's nifty camera tricks.
The People Hub not only takes care of your phonebook, but also integrates your Facebook, Windows Live, Twitter, and LinkedIn contacts at one place. I really like the way how the alphabet tiles help you find the desired contact with minimal scrolling. Moreover, the OS offers extremely responsive on-screen keyboard, when compared to Android. The handset's call quality and network reception were excellent during our tests. Other connectivity features such as Wi-Fi and 3G also worked fine.
Of course we know it is a bubble, an algorithmic bubble if you will. But with its market valuation approaching $1.75 billion and rising, it’s a bubble with a future. The four-year-old currency, money built for the Internet, unlike cards and bank transfers that are being adapted for the Net, points to future where digital money will be the norm.
That’s because the digital crypto currency, whose origins are still shrouded in mystery (it is believed that it was created by a group of programmers who worked under the name Satoshi Nakamoto), has crucial properties that make it exceedingly attractive as an alternate currency. It is inflation resistant because it is free from government and banks manipulation and for some Russian tycoons the fact that it can’t be suddenly seized is another.
The quest for “new money” has been on for nearly three decades now ever since January 1980 when the final rites on the dollar were first read. In the alternate space there have been experiments, most currently Facebook credits, Linden dollars in 2nd Life or the QQ coins in China, which have served as currency in limited ways.
But the Bitcoin is another thing altogether. Possessing the twin facets of demand and liquidity, it can shrug off the underlying weakness of lacking a basis for its value. The 21 million Bitcoins limit built into it ensures its scarcity.
Debate right now is centered around whether the Bitcoin is a bubble. Most money managers have written it off. Nouriel Roubini, a bubbler-buster if ever there was one, tweeted recently, “Gold-bug suckers found another irrational useless bubble fad, the Bitcoin, the bubble flavour of the day. So they are dissin gold 4 Bitcoin”. And the extreme volatility of Bitcoin lends credence to the scepticism. Over the last 12 days the virtual currency has doubled its value.
But to write it off is both premature and short-sighted. Premature because a digital currency was waiting to happen and if not Bitcoin, another will replace it if it does go down. And short sighted because the history of money tells us that the momentum to a new form of currency starts building slowly, but eventually it can’t be halted.
The big charge against Bitcoin, that its value swings wildly depending on people’s faith in it, can as easily be levelled against derivatives. Nor is a currency that operates outside the pale of governments new to us in India where black money is equally institutionalized. Even overseas, on a rough estimate there is $300 trillion stashed away in offshore havens, well outside the purview of central banks and regulators.
The disbelief that Bitcoin or its equivalent could be the future of money isn’t new. The move to plastic was surrounded with equal scepticism. Starting with Diners in 1950, it took eight years for the next credit cards to appear in the market. And it wasn’t until the 1980s that credit cards became a particularly profitable business. But of course by 2006 credit card payments had overtaken cash or cheques for payments.
Most bubbles have a habit of creating something new, distinctly unbubble-like. Even if Bitcoins go under, the era of a pure digital currency which doesn’t have its antecedents in the physical world, is here. Frauds, inflation, Cyprus, have all ensured that the process of disintermediation in the money trial has begun. If it is sites selling porn, drugs and escort services today, it may well be bars tomorrow. Oh wait, that’s already happened. EVR, a bar in New York has started accepting Bitcoins for indoor Tracking.
Going straight to the point, the handset's sound quality is great. The loudspeaker is indeed loud. Apart from the default music player, the phone comes with Nokia Music. It's better to opt for the latter since it offers equaliser settings and Dolby enhancement. Moreover, it offers unlimited free track downloads for a year. The bundled earphones are just ok, but not in the same league as Samsung, who ship much better IEMs with its phones.
Like every other WP8 device, this one also lacks FM radio. According to Nokia's official blog though, the Snapdragon S4 chipset consists of a radio receiver, so a future update might enable this feature. Coming to the subject of video playback, the phone is compatible with MP4, WMV, and AVI videos up to 720p resolution. However, MKV videos are still a no-go.
The 5 megapixel snapper is surprisingly good. The resulting pictures contain incredible amount of details for a budget phone. More importantly, the colours look natural. Click here, to download the untouched sample. Similar to the high-end Lumia 920, this one packs in Nokia-exclusive lenses such as Cinemagraph, Smart shoot, and Panorama. To find out the usage of these camera plugins, go through our detailed article about Nokia's nifty camera tricks.
The People Hub not only takes care of your phonebook, but also integrates your Facebook, Windows Live, Twitter, and LinkedIn contacts at one place. I really like the way how the alphabet tiles help you find the desired contact with minimal scrolling. Moreover, the OS offers extremely responsive on-screen keyboard, when compared to Android. The handset's call quality and network reception were excellent during our tests. Other connectivity features such as Wi-Fi and 3G also worked fine.
2013年4月3日 星期三
Uttar Pradesh CM Akhilesh Yadav lay foundation
Proactively pursuing the agenda of development under the guidance and leadership of the Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mr Akhilesh Yadav, the Noida Authority, greater Noida Authority and the Yamuna Expressway Authority are ready with a road map of development and all round rtls.
And the giant strides of development would come to public domain on April 2, as chief minister Mr Akhilesh Yadav unveils an ambitious development bonanza of Rs 3337 crore through a bevy of developmental projects across Noida, greater Noida and the Yamuna Expressway.
By far the biggest developmental package for a single city, would included a 35 mld sewage treatment plant (STP) situated in sector 123 of Noida, which has been built on the sequential batch reactor (SBR) modern technology.
With the inauguration of this STP, NOIDA will become first city in India having capacity to threat 100% sewage it produces. This STP, built after a threadbare study and recommendation of IIT Roorkie is set to benefit 28 sectors of Noida and would help the city in living up to the ISO 14001:2004 standards in maintaining the environment of the city.
Other than this, the chief minister would be laying the foundation stones of projects like the Nari Niketan building in sector 34 (estimated cost of Rs 22 crore), an underpass at the intersections of sector 32, 35, 39 and 51 (estimated cost of Rs 50 crore), underpasses at the master plan road number 3 in sectors 94 and 95, estimated to cost the state government Rs 40 crore.
The Nari Niketan would be built over a 5400 square metre plot where unwanted kids and women, orphans, destitute would be looked after and efforts would be undertaken to rehabilitate women in need. The five storey building would have 7500 square meter of covered area in which 200 girls aged between 7 to 17 would be living. For guidance the Nari Niketan would have counseling rooms, classes for primary education, short term handicraft courses and other vocation training to enable them to earn their livelihood.
The proposed underpass on the intersection of sectors 32,35,39 and 51 would have four lanes with a two metre median and would be built parallel to the Metro line. The slab of the underpass would be 46 metres wide and the length would be 740 metres. On the sides of this underpass seven metre wide slip roads would be laid. On the proposed four lane underpass on the master plan road numbered 3 in sectors 94, 95, a seven metre clover leaf would be built on the side which will be used by the traffic coming from Delhi to sector 94.
Aware of the growing population in the city, both human and vehicular, the Noida Authority has recognized lack of parking space as a major bottleneck in spacing and easing out of traffic in the city. A multi-level car parking at the busy sector 18 has hence been planned at a cost of Rs 250 crore and chief minister Mr Akhilesh Yadav would be laying the foundation scheme of this ambitious project on April 2.
The multi-level parking at the busy sector-18 in Noida would be spread over 26840 square meters would accommodate 3085 cars and would be manned by hundreds of close circuit television cameras (CCTVs). Battery operated shuttle vehicles would be used to bring and take car users from the parking to nearby areas.
Amongst other ambitious projects of which the foundation stone would be laid at the hands of the chief minister is the district hospital at sector 39, to be built at an estimated cost of Rs 424 crore. Cheap, accessible and quality Healthcare for every person in the state is a dream vision of the chief minister. Keeping in lines with this, the district hospital will be built over a 14,000 square meter plot and will have200 beds.
Residential facilities for the doctors and other support staff would also be constructed within the district hospital campus. Equipped with a modern trauma unit, modern pathology lab and radiological units, intensive care, special 100 bed reservation for women and pregnant ladies as well, this hospital is set to be a big boon to the people of Noida, the national capital region (NCR) and neighbouring areas.
A big relief for Noida residents would come in form of two - 400 kv (sector 123) and 400/220 kv capacity (sector 148) power sub-stations, estimated at Rs 1016 crore, foundation of which would be laid by chief minister Mr Akhilesh Yadav on April 2. The Girls Inter College at Hoshiyarpur village in sector 51, Noida, foundation stone of which would also be laid by the chief minister will be constructed over a 8300 square meter land. Initially it would have two floors, but would have provisions to real time Location system.
The school building will house 35 class rooms, special labs for physics, Maths and chemistry a multipurpose hall and a library. With the state government committed towards more educational opportunities for girls, this college in a way would go a long way towards realizing this cherished dream.
The state government had last year decided to build a medical university at greater Noida at a cost of Rs 500 crore, foundation of which will also be laid by Mr Akhilesh Yadav. The greater Noida Authority has already made available 56.50 3acre land for this. 100 students would be given admission every year here in courses like MBBS, MD, MS, DM and MH. The academic session of this university is proposed to begin August 2013. The Chief Minister will also kickstart the OPD facility of 500 bedded Multispeciality Hospital attached to the above Medical College. The Hospital will provide advanced and affordable medical facility to the villagers/residents of Greater Noida and neighbouring districts.
Administrative office of greater Noida at a cost of Rs 300 crore is also being built. The chief minister will lay the foundation stone of this building, equipped with all modern technology, spread over 22800 square metre. The construction work will be completed in three years in which one tower of 21 floors, one tower of four floors and another tower of 17 floors. This building will be a green building which will facilitate the growth of Greater Noida.
And the giant strides of development would come to public domain on April 2, as chief minister Mr Akhilesh Yadav unveils an ambitious development bonanza of Rs 3337 crore through a bevy of developmental projects across Noida, greater Noida and the Yamuna Expressway.
By far the biggest developmental package for a single city, would included a 35 mld sewage treatment plant (STP) situated in sector 123 of Noida, which has been built on the sequential batch reactor (SBR) modern technology.
With the inauguration of this STP, NOIDA will become first city in India having capacity to threat 100% sewage it produces. This STP, built after a threadbare study and recommendation of IIT Roorkie is set to benefit 28 sectors of Noida and would help the city in living up to the ISO 14001:2004 standards in maintaining the environment of the city.
Other than this, the chief minister would be laying the foundation stones of projects like the Nari Niketan building in sector 34 (estimated cost of Rs 22 crore), an underpass at the intersections of sector 32, 35, 39 and 51 (estimated cost of Rs 50 crore), underpasses at the master plan road number 3 in sectors 94 and 95, estimated to cost the state government Rs 40 crore.
The Nari Niketan would be built over a 5400 square metre plot where unwanted kids and women, orphans, destitute would be looked after and efforts would be undertaken to rehabilitate women in need. The five storey building would have 7500 square meter of covered area in which 200 girls aged between 7 to 17 would be living. For guidance the Nari Niketan would have counseling rooms, classes for primary education, short term handicraft courses and other vocation training to enable them to earn their livelihood.
The proposed underpass on the intersection of sectors 32,35,39 and 51 would have four lanes with a two metre median and would be built parallel to the Metro line. The slab of the underpass would be 46 metres wide and the length would be 740 metres. On the sides of this underpass seven metre wide slip roads would be laid. On the proposed four lane underpass on the master plan road numbered 3 in sectors 94, 95, a seven metre clover leaf would be built on the side which will be used by the traffic coming from Delhi to sector 94.
Aware of the growing population in the city, both human and vehicular, the Noida Authority has recognized lack of parking space as a major bottleneck in spacing and easing out of traffic in the city. A multi-level car parking at the busy sector 18 has hence been planned at a cost of Rs 250 crore and chief minister Mr Akhilesh Yadav would be laying the foundation scheme of this ambitious project on April 2.
The multi-level parking at the busy sector-18 in Noida would be spread over 26840 square meters would accommodate 3085 cars and would be manned by hundreds of close circuit television cameras (CCTVs). Battery operated shuttle vehicles would be used to bring and take car users from the parking to nearby areas.
Amongst other ambitious projects of which the foundation stone would be laid at the hands of the chief minister is the district hospital at sector 39, to be built at an estimated cost of Rs 424 crore. Cheap, accessible and quality Healthcare for every person in the state is a dream vision of the chief minister. Keeping in lines with this, the district hospital will be built over a 14,000 square meter plot and will have200 beds.
Residential facilities for the doctors and other support staff would also be constructed within the district hospital campus. Equipped with a modern trauma unit, modern pathology lab and radiological units, intensive care, special 100 bed reservation for women and pregnant ladies as well, this hospital is set to be a big boon to the people of Noida, the national capital region (NCR) and neighbouring areas.
A big relief for Noida residents would come in form of two - 400 kv (sector 123) and 400/220 kv capacity (sector 148) power sub-stations, estimated at Rs 1016 crore, foundation of which would be laid by chief minister Mr Akhilesh Yadav on April 2. The Girls Inter College at Hoshiyarpur village in sector 51, Noida, foundation stone of which would also be laid by the chief minister will be constructed over a 8300 square meter land. Initially it would have two floors, but would have provisions to real time Location system.
The school building will house 35 class rooms, special labs for physics, Maths and chemistry a multipurpose hall and a library. With the state government committed towards more educational opportunities for girls, this college in a way would go a long way towards realizing this cherished dream.
The state government had last year decided to build a medical university at greater Noida at a cost of Rs 500 crore, foundation of which will also be laid by Mr Akhilesh Yadav. The greater Noida Authority has already made available 56.50 3acre land for this. 100 students would be given admission every year here in courses like MBBS, MD, MS, DM and MH. The academic session of this university is proposed to begin August 2013. The Chief Minister will also kickstart the OPD facility of 500 bedded Multispeciality Hospital attached to the above Medical College. The Hospital will provide advanced and affordable medical facility to the villagers/residents of Greater Noida and neighbouring districts.
Administrative office of greater Noida at a cost of Rs 300 crore is also being built. The chief minister will lay the foundation stone of this building, equipped with all modern technology, spread over 22800 square metre. The construction work will be completed in three years in which one tower of 21 floors, one tower of four floors and another tower of 17 floors. This building will be a green building which will facilitate the growth of Greater Noida.
訂閱：
文章 (Atom)