Uniformity of lighting for pedestrians is often assumed to have been achieved in mixed traffic environments when the lighting uniformity requirements for vehicular traffic have been fulfilled. Uniformity of lighting for drivers is commonly evaluated based on quantitative data on parameters such as overall luminance uniformity. However, methods for evaluating uniformity from the perspective of other road users are currently somewhat lacking. This study discusses qualitative and quantitative methods of assessing street lighting uniformity, and the potential implications for lighting design and the road users. We used convergence design and imbedded design based on two field studies. The research purpose is twofold: first, to study if, and how, measured lighting uniformity corresponds with visual perception. Secondly, to identify and explain the additional value that a combined method approach can contribute. The study considers examples of when the measured uniformity corresponds to visually perceived uniformity and when they do not correspond.

Lighting uniformity is a key factor in traffic safety, and it could even result in energy savings for light installations. However, highly uniform horizontal road lighting for motorized vehicles may not be optimal for pedestrian roads. Therefore, it is important to evaluate the way in which pedestrians experience road lighting uniformity. Accordingly, we employed a qualitative approach to examine pedestrian road lighting uniformity. Visual analyses were used to exemplify and discuss the perceived uniformity. The case studies were performed on three pedestrian roads with similar light installations. The results show that the experience of road lighting uniformity differs substantially between the three roads. Based on the case studies, there are many aspects that need to be considered beyond the light falling on the horizontal surfaces. This study suggests that the visual experience of road lighting uniformity for pedestrians is difficult to estimate with photometric values because the visual impact of uniformity is highly influenced by the spatial context and landscape.

This study estimated the external cost of air pollution from shipping by means of a meta-regression analysis, which has not been made before. Three pollutants, which were included in most of the primary studies, were considered: nitrogen oxides (NOx), sulphur dioxides (SO2) and particulate matters with a diameter of max 2.5 micrometres (PM2.5). All primary studies included damages of health and a majority added impacts on agriculture and estimated the cost of air pollutants by transferring cost estimates from studies on costs of air emissions from transports in Europe. Different regression models and estimators were used and robust results were found of statistically significant emission elasticities of below one, i.e. total external costs increase by less than 1% when emissions increase by 1%. There was a small variation between the pollutants, with the highest elasticity for PM2.5 and lowest for NOx. Calculations of the marginal external cost of the pollutants showed the same pattern, with this cost being approximately six times higher for PM2.5 than for the other pollutants. Common to all pollutants was that the marginal external cost decreases when emission increases. Another robust result was a significant increase in the cost of studies published in journals compared with other publication outlets. These findings point out some caution when transferring constant external unit cost of air pollutant from shipping, which is much applied in the literature, and the cost functions estimated in this study could thus provide a complementary transfer mechanism.

The aim of this review was tomap synergies and trade-offs between sustainable development and energy efficiency and savings regarding exterior lighting. Exterior lighting, such as public road and street lighting, requires significant amounts of energy and hinders sustainable development through its increasing of light pollution, ecological impact, and global climate change. Interlinkages between indicators in sustainability and energy that have positive interactions will lead to a mutual reinforcement in the decision-making process, and vice versa, interlinkages between trade-offs may lead to unwanted and conflicting effects. Very few studies have presented a clear vision of how exterior lighting should be contributing to, and not counteracting, the sustainable development of our planet. This study was conducted through a theoretical and systematic analysis that examined the interactions between sustainable development and energy performance based on a framework using indicators and variables, and by reviewing the current literature. Additionally, 17 indicators of energy efficiency and energy savings were identified and used in the analysis. Most interactions between variables for sustainable development and energy performance (52%) were found to be synergistic. The synergistic interactions were mostly found (71%) in the ecological and environmental dimension showing that environmental and ecological sustainability goes hand in hand with energy efficiency and savings. Trade-offs were found only in the economic and social dimensions accounting for 18% of the interactions identified. This review shows that the interactions between sustainable development and energy performance can be used to establish more efficient policies for decision-making processes regarding exterior lighting.

There are several environmental and ecological effects of shipping. However, these are rarely assessed in total in the scientific literature. Thus, the aim of this study was to summarize the different impacts of water-based transport on aquatic and nearshore ecosystems and to identify knowledge gaps and areas for future research. The review identified several environmental and ecological consequences within the main impact categories of water discharges, physical impacts, and air emissions. However, although quantitative data on these consequences are generally scarce the shipping contribution to acidification by SOx- and NOx-emissions has been quantified to some extent. There are several knowledge gaps regarding the ecological consequences of, for example, the increasing amount of chemicals transported on water, the spread of non-indigenous species coupled with climate change, and physical impacts such as shipping noise and artificial light. The whole plethora of environmental consequences, as well as potential synergistic effects, should be seriously considered in transport planning.

Road lighting causes unwanted ecological impact on species and habitats where species may be protected and/or light-sensitive. Yet, there is very little information available on how roadlighting should be ecologically designed while simultaneously considering energy efficiency and the regulations needed for safety reasons. The aim of this study was study designs of different dimensions regarding energy efficiency, ecological impact and the compliance with regulations for traffic safety. By using DIALux evo simulations with four different LED luminaires, different scenarios of road lighting designs (pole distance of 10m, 25m and 40m, and pole heights of 3m, 5m, and 8m) on a 7m wide road was evaluated. Ecological thresholds of 1 lux and 0.1 lux are possible to get below at distances from the road edge between 5–11m, and 8.5–20m, respectively. Results are discussed from the perspectives of increased demand on energy efficiency on road lighting.

Accurate prediction of community responses to global change drivers (GCDs) is critical given the effects of biodiversity on ecosystem services. There is consensus that human activities are driving species extinctions at the global scale, but debate remains over whether GCDs are systematically altering local communities worldwide. Across 105 experiments that included over 400 experimental manipulations, we found evidence for a lagged response of herbaceous plant communities to GCDs caused by shifts in the identities and relative abundances of species, often without a corresponding difference in species richness. These results provide evidence that community responses are pervasive across a wide variety of GCDs on long-term temporal scales and that these responses increase in strength when multiple GCDs are simultaneously imposed.Global change drivers (GCDs) are expected to alter community structure and consequently, the services that ecosystems provide. Yet, few experimental investigations have examined effects of GCDs on plant community structure across multiple ecosystem types, and those that do exist present conflicting patterns. In an unprecedented global synthesis of over 100 experiments that manipulated factors linked to GCDs, we show that herbaceous plant community responses depend on experimental manipulation length and number of factors manipulated. We found that plant communities are fairly resistant to experimentally manipulated GCDs in the short term (<10 y). In contrast, long-term (≥10 y) experiments show increasing community divergence of treatments from control conditions. Surprisingly, these community responses occurred with similar frequency across the GCD types manipulated in our database. However, community responses were more common when 3 or more GCDs were simultaneously manipulated, suggesting the emergence of additive or synergistic effects of multiple drivers, particularly over long time periods. In half of the cases, GCD manipulations caused a difference in community composition without a corresponding species richness difference, indicating that species reordering or replacement is an important mechanism of community responses to GCDs and should be given greater consideration when examining consequences of GCDs for the biodiversity–ecosystem function relationship. Human activities are currently driving unparalleled global changes worldwide. Our analyses provide the most comprehensive evidence to date that these human activities may have widespread impacts on plant community composition globally, which will increase in frequency over time and be greater in areas where communities face multiple GCDs simultaneously.

GrassPlot is a collaborative vegetation-plot database organised by the Eurasian Dry Grassland Group (EDGG) and listed in the Global Index of Vegetation-Plot Databases (GIVD ID EU-00-003). Following a previous Long Database Report (Dengler et al. 2018, Phytocoenologia 48, 331–347), we provide here the first update on content and functionality of GrassPlot. The current version (GrassPlot v. 2.00) contains a total of 190,673 plots of different grain sizes across 28,171 independent plots, with 4,654 nested-plot series including at least four grain sizes. The database has improved its content as well as its functionality, including addition and harmonization of header data (land use, information on nestedness, structure and ecology) and preparation of species composition data. Currently, GrassPlot data are intensively used for broad-scale analyses of different aspects of alpha and beta diversity in grassland ecosystems.