Eva Kassens-Noor

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Michigan State University

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Publications

 
Book
 
 

Kassens-Noor, E. (2012). Planning Olympic Legacies: Transport Dreams and Urban Realities. Oxford: Routledge

http://www.routledge.com/books/details/9780415689717/

 

When a city wins the right to hold the Olympics, one of the often cited advantages to the region is the catalytic effect upon the urban and transport projects of the host cities. However, with unparalleled access to documents and records, Eva Kassens-Noor questions and challenges this fundamental assertion of host cities who claim to have used the Olympic Games as a way to move forward their urban agendas. In fact, transport dreams to stage the "perfect Games" of the International Olympic Committee and the governments of the host cities have lead to urban realities that significantly differ from the development path the city had set out to accomplish before winning the Olympic bid. Ultimately it is precisely the IOC's influence--and the city's foresight and sophistication (or lack thereof) in coping with it--that determines whether years after the Games there are legacies benefitting the former hosts. The text is supported by revealing interviews from lead host city planners and key documents, which highlight striking discrepancies between media broadcasts and the internal communications between the IOC and host city governments. It focuses on the inside story of the urban and transport change process undergone by four cities (Barcelona, Atlanta, Sydney, and Athens) that staged the Olympics and forecasts London and Rio de Janeiro's urban trajectories. The final chapter advises cities on how to leverage the Olympic opportunity to advance their long-run urban strategic plans and interests while fulfilling the International Olympic Committee's fundamental requirements. This is a uniquely positioned look at why Olympic cities have --- or do not have --- the transport and urban legacies they had wished for. The book will be of interest to planners, government agencies and those involved in organising future Games.

  

 

Peer-reviewed Publications
 
Kassens-Noor, E. (fortcoming). The Transport Legacy of the Olympic Games, 1992-2012. Journal of Urban Affairs  

  • Legacy planning in preparation for the Olympic Games has significantly grown in importance for host cities and the IOC because of the wasteful investments for some previous Games. Since the late 1990’s, the IOC has actively sought to prevent such over-spending through a transfer of knowledge program, in which valuable lessons are passed from one host city to the next. This paper analyzes the transport legacies of the Olympic Games, using original archive material and interviews with key decision-makers in five cities. While previous research into the effects of the Olympic Games on host cities suggests that infrastructural legacies are place-specific, the main argument of this paper is that the transport legacies of the Olympic Games are much more uniform across the host cities. Even though the host cities’ transport systems were intrinsically different pre-Olympics, the author finds similar features of the Olympic Transport System, which were developed through the Transfer of Knowledge program, produced similar legacies. In explaining the creation of transport legacies through Olympically motivated drivers, the author suggests the Olympics might trigger similar transport developments in future host cities. Therefore, city planners can use Olympic transport features as powerful catalysts to accelerate their urban and transport plans.

 

Kassens-Noor, E. (2012). Twitter as a teaching practice to enhance active and informal learning in higher education: the case of sustainable tweets. Journal of Active Learning in Higher Education 13(1), pp. 67-79

  • With the rise of Web 2.0, a multitude of new possibilities on how to use these online technologies for active learning has intrigued researchers. While most instructors have used Twitter for in-class discussions, this study explores the teaching practice of Twitter as an active, informal, outside-of-class learning tool. Through a comparative experiment in a small classroom setting, this study asks whether the use of Twitter aids students in learning of a particular subject matter. And if so, in which learning contexts Twitter offers advantages over more traditional teaching methods. This exploratory study showed potential opportunities and pitfalls Twitter could bring to the e-learning community in higher education.

 

Kassens-Noor, E. (2011). Planning Against Hazards for a Resilient and Sustainable Community Through Adaptive Transportation Systems. Journal of Homeland Security. Edition: Catastrophes and Complex Systems: Transportation

 
  • This paper defines the role that transportation can and should play for resilient communities in hazard-prone regions. It lays out the demands and potential supply options in adapting land, marine, and air transportation systems while creating resilient and sustainable communities. It pays particular attention to the integration of adaptive and mitigative transport measures, so as to prevent future impacts of climate change.

 

 

Neal, Z., and E. Kassens-Noor (2011). The business passenger niche: Comparing legacy carriers and Southwest during a national recession. Journal of Air Transport Management 17, pp. 231-232 

  • We examine how legacy and low-cost air carriers’ roles in serving business passengers in the US changed during the global economic recession from 2007. Quarterly data is examined to test the impact of a recession on the air travel behavior. We find that since 2007 business passengers represent a declining proportion of legacy carriers’ passenger volume, while they  epresent an increasing proportion of Southwest’s passengers. This trend suggests that Southwest’s market niche has shifted,  nd that the airline now plays a role similar to that of legacy  carriers.

 

 

Kassens-Noor, E. (2010). Sustaining the Momentum - the Olympics as potential Catalysts for enhancing Urban Transport. Transportation Research Record 2187, pp. 106-113
  • Positive urban impacts of the Olympic Games are often publicized but seldom evaluated empirically. Through the analysis of Olympic transport plans and expert interviews, this paper tests whether transport measures implemented during the Games were sustained in four host cities. The paper consists of three main parts. The first provides an overview of the challenges the Olympics impose on urban transport systems, primarily in terms of passenger transport. The second part reviews the long-term transport goals each city had targeted to achieve through the Olympics. Furthermore, it categorizes the transport measures implemented to handle the Olympic peak demand. The third part analyzes comparatively how the cities changed and in particular, which of the measures that supported the passenger operations have been sustained. Despite the fact that planners, governments, and residents desire to use the Olympic Games as a catalyst for lasting transport improvements, actual implementations were mainly of temporary nature. Only in a few instances, did Olympic efforts lead to lasting benefits for urban transport systems. The paper suggests a long-term, comprehensive planning strategy for using the Olympics as a catalyst for change in order to sustain the momentum the Games give to a host city.
 
 
Kassens-Noor, E. (2010). Peak Demands in Transport Systems - an Agenda for Research. Paper ID G6-01541. In Selected Proceedings of the 12th World Conference on Transport Research Society, ISBN 978-989-96986-1-1 (Editors: J. Viegas and R. Macário), Lisbon, Portugal, July 11-15.
  • This paper is a pioneering effort in developing key concepts for peak demand transport. Peak demands in transport systems occur during mega-events, e.g. the Olympic Games or mass evacuations, which strain the pre-existing transport capacity far beyond its maximum limit. The author defines mega-events in the transport context as follows: a transport mega-event is an extraordinary temporary combination of mass transport flows, requiring the involvement and coordination of all available metropolitan transport modes with different service levels and requiring temporary and long-term modifications to the transport system. Peak demands as analyzed in this paper go far beyond the regular congestion levels, and constitute exceptional levels of passenger demand. Transport agencies have to extensively plan for those peak demands, for which many agencies start their planning efforts from scratch or draw on common practices within the same mega-event group (e.g. evacuations). This paper intends to jumpstart thinking outside the box by cross-comparing transport practices for various mega-events that have relatively little in common. The contribution of this paper is to identify six common key concepts among those different mega-events. Based on these finding the author concludes that these concepts are indeed applicable to any transport mega-event and suggests further inquiry into the field of peak demand transport planning.
 
 
Odoni A., M. Stamatopoulos, E. Kassens, I. Metsovitis (2009). Preparing an Airport for the Olympic Games: Athens. Journal of Infrastructure Systems, 15 (1), pp. 50-59.
  • Athens International Airport served as the principal gateway to Greece for athletes and the Olympic Family and for the general public during the Olympic Games of 2004. The airport’s performance during the Games was universally praised. This paper describes many facets of the extensive preparations for the event and of actual operations during the event. These include: principal strategic decisions, coordination with the major stakeholders, air traffic and passenger forecasts, new facilities and upgrading or modifications to existing ones, air traffic slot management, planning for and modeling of the flows of members of the Olympic Family through the airport, and some initiatives with respect to organizational structure, security, and contingency planning. The paper also outlines some more general “lessons” for airports that will handle events of similar magnitude and visibility in the future.
 
Book Chapters
 

Kassens-Noor, E. (forthcoming). Managing Transport during the Olympic Games. In S. Frawley and D. Adair (eds) Managing the Olympic Games. Sydney: Palgrave Macmillan
 

Smith, T., J. Molloy, E. Kassens-Noor,  W. Li and M. Colunga (forthcoming). Developing an Interdisciplinary Heuristic for Multidisciplinary Faculty Writing Groups. In A. E. Geller and M. Eodice (eds) Working with Faculty Writers.  Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press

 

 
 
Editor in Chief
Kassens, E. Projections Vol. 9 (Summer 2009): “Sustainable Transportation: An International Perspective”                                                                                     
Planning Journal of the Department of Urban Studies and Planning, MIT, USA
 
Dissertation
Kassens, E. (2009). Transportation Planning for Mega Events: a Model of Urban Change.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge MA
Supervisor: Karen R. Polenske (MIT), Christopher P. Zegras (MIT), Arn Howitt (Harvard)
 
Master Thesis
Kassens, E. (2005). How to prepare an airport for the Olympic Games.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge MA
Supervisor: Amedeo Odoni (MIT)
 
 
 
Conferences
 

 

Upcoming
 

Kassens-Noor, E.  The Transport Legacy of the Olympic Games. 32nd International Geographical Congress. Cologne, Germany, August 26-30, 2012.

Session Co-chair: "Mega events, globalization and urban development I"
     (UDC 10-01 )

 
 

Selected Presentations

Crawford, P., S. Lang, K. Millenbah, M. Orth, E. Kassens-Noor, E. Drake Evaluating Teaching Excellence across Academic Cultures. Poster presented at the MSU SoTL Symposium, 2011. 

Vertalka J. and E. Kassens-Noor The resilience of airports: adaptation planning against hazards and for potential disaster recovery. paper presented at the Urban Affairs Association. New Orleans, USA, March 16- 19, 2011. 

Kassens-Noor, E. (Invited Panelist) Planning Against Hazards for a Resilient and Sustainable Community Through Adaptive Transportation Systems. White Paper presented at the 2011 DHS Science Conference - Fifth Annual DHS Network Summit. Washington DC, USA, March 30-April 1, 2011. 

Kassens-Noor, E. The Urban Legacy of the Olympic Games paper presented at the Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning Annual Conference. Minnesota, USA, Oct. 7-10, 2010
Pre-organized session creator: „Mega Events: Olympics, World Cups and World Fairs“
 
Kassens-Noor, E. Peak Demands in Transport Systems - an Agenda for Research presented at the "World Conference of Transport Research" Conference in Lisbon, Portugal, 2010
Session chair: G 6.3
 
Kassens, E. Changing cities through Mega Events presented at the “Urban Affairs” Conference in Honolulu, USA, 2010
Moderator for session: Reassessing Big Projects and Events
 
Kassens, E. Sustaining the Momentum: the Olympics as potential Catalysts for enhancing Urban Transport presented at the “Transport Research Board” Conference in Washington D.C., USA, 2010 
 

Kassens, E. Sustaining the Momentum: the Olympics as potential Catalysts for enhancing Urban Transport presented at the “Sport Mega-events and their Legacies” Conference in Capetown, South Africa, 2009

 

Kassens, E. Lesson’s learned from transportation planning for the Olympics – are the innovative short-term measures applicable to metropolitan transport systems? presented at ACSP Conference, Crystal City, USA 2009

 

Kassens, E. Sustaining the Momentum: mega events as catalysts presented at ACSP conference, Chicago, USA 2008

 

Kassens, E. Transportation Planning for Sustainable Urban Transport Development through Mega-Events presented at ACSP conference, Milwaukee, USA 2007

 

Kassens, E. Transport Planning for Mega-Events: Practices of the Past invited speaker to the first Cities for Mobility Conference, Stuttgart, Germany 2007

 

Kassens, E. Athens Olympic Transport Modelling presented at The First Transportation Engineering Research Symposium (MAITE), Cambridge, USA 2005