Date of Award

8-2023

Document Type

Campus Access Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Department

Business Administration

First Advisor

Jean-Pierre Kuilboer

Second Advisor

Noushin Ashrafi

Third Advisor

Roger Blake

Abstract

This study examines the problem of designing the Urban Mobility System (UMS) in three essays. The UMS is in a crisis of uncertainty, complexity, and values divergence. However, the situation has characteristics that suggest the underlying presence of a tractable approach. In the first essay we define the System and the related decision problem. We find the phenomenon an accessible, organized complex-adaptive system in the context of operationalized objectives and a partially ordered solution space. Decisions determining system state are hierarchical and agglomerative. In the second essay, we model how decision makers produce and consume information in the system. This leads to a communications view in which the information necessary to system actors is ingenerated and exchanged. The third essay explores how improved system states are systematically achieved. The study proposes a structure and frame for addressing this problem incorporating several disciplines. We conclude by presenting the incorporating structure as a transdisciplinarity: an approach that synthesizes a new method from multiple disciplines to solve a complex problem.

Comments

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