Significance
Significance is an independent research institute specialised in transport. It is established in The Hague. It works for clients in the Netherlands and throughout Western Europe.
Significance’s ambition is to provide analytical excellence with a strong emphasis on innovative modelling. It's core competences include transport demand forecasting, land-use/transport interaction, logistics, monitoring and evaluation, and stated preference research.
Significance is headed by Eric Kroes and Gerard de Jong, and has strong links with leading research institutes and academics worldwide.
News messages
Public transport use by students (January, 2012)
A combination of the Dutch Public Transport Operators and the Ministry of Education Culture and Science has commissioned Significance together with Panteia to estimate the annual distance travelled by students in public transport in 2012/2013.
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Expert workshop on transport reliability (November, 2011)
In the feasibility study on including transport reliability in the evaluation of federal infrastructure projects for the German Ministry of Transport (BMVBS), that Significance carries out together with Goudappel Coffeng and NEA, a one-day expert workshop was organised that took place on 29 November 2011 in Berlin.
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PBL delivers 2011 Spatial Exploration Study to Minister of Infrastructure and Environment (September, 2011)
On September 7th, The Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency (PBL) delivered the 2011 Spatial Exploration Study to the Dutch Minister of Infrastructure and Environment Schultz van Haegen. Significance supported PBL in creating the spatial analysis using TIGRIS XL.
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High speed rail in Norway (July, 2011)
Significance has provided support to Atkins in a study for the Norwegian Rail Transport Authority on the potential for high-speed trains in Norway. More specifically, we carried out various analyses on the demand for freight trains operating at 160 and 200km/hour. At the moment Significance is carrying out a follow-up study.
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Freight transport modelling in Italy (April, 2011)
Significance is providing support to the Italian research organisation SiTI, based in Turin, on two projects: the development of a stated preference survey and a discrete choice model for assessing freight transport service attributes along the Genoa-Rotterdam corridor and the development of a freight transport model for north-west Italy.
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Significance develops strategic multimodal models (March, 2011)
In response to increasing demand for fast, strategic transport models Significance has developed two prototypes for the Netherlands: (1) a very fast transport model without spatial computation components with a run time of a few minutes, and (2) a fast model with spatial components and a run time of less than half an hour.
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Graduation on a port competition model for a national port strategy applied to the Port of Rotterdam (February, 2011)
On March 25th, Chris Posthuma defended his thesis for his master at Delft University of Technology on port strategies for the Port of Rotterdam and he graduated successfully. At Significance, Chris further developed the port competition model and applied it to analyse the effectiveness of national port strategies for the PoR.
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Update of Dutch Railways passenger demand model (January, 2011)
Commissioned by NS, Significance has started the update of “De Kast”, the successful demand forecasting model of Dutch Railways. Using the most up to date data available, the demand elasticities are re-estimated, and several improvements are made to the prediction methodology.
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The value of comfort (December, 2010)
The Regional transport authority of Paris (STIF) has decided to award a major study into the value of comfort to Significance. The one-year study will include qualitative research which we will carry out with Cyrille Gazave (CDG Conseil) and Catherine Delannoy (CDA), and quantitative research that Significance will conduct with advice by Professor Mark Wardman (ITS Leeds).
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Essay on possibilities for improving the Dutch national transport model (LMS) (November, 2010)
In 2008, Significance wrote an essay for the Netherlands Institute for Transport Policy Analysis (KiM) on possibilities for improving the Dutch national transport model (LMS). Recently, KiM published its own report on the use of transport models (www.kimnet.nl). The essay of Significance has now also been released and can be found here on the Significance website.
AEOLUS air demand forecasting model (September, 2010)
Under a new contract from the Dutch Ministry of Transport we started to update the AEOLUS air demand forecasting model. Later this year it will be applied for testing a range of new scenarios, currently under development.
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Market penetration of electric passenger cars (August, 2010)
Significance intern Jacomien Spamer from South Africa has completed her research on the market share of electric vehicles in The Netherlands. Based upon large scale market research she has developed a forecasting model that can be used to predict market shares for a range of different scenario and policy assumptions. Within Significance research continues to develop a complete dynamic simulator.
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Motorways of the Sea (July, 2010)
The European Commission wants to promote maritime transport as an alternative to fully land-based transport. An important part of this, the Motorways of the Sea (MOS) policy, is now being revised by the Commission.
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Grand Paris – appraisal methodology (June, 2010)
Significance has been asked to provide advice on the evaluation methodology for the new automated metro system proposed for the Grand Paris project.
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Societal Value of Student Public Transport Pass (May, 2010)
The Steering Group Public Transport has commissioned us (together with NEA) to estimate the impact of the possible abandonment of the current Student Public Transport Pass.
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Mobility effects of election manifestos (April, 2010)
Significance has been commissioned to assist the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency and the Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis to appraise the mobility effects of the election manifestos issued by the different political parties in the Netherlands.
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Renewed website (April, 2010)
We continuously update our website, but as of now we have renewed the presentation of our team.
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Updated TIGRIS XL model used in Spatial Exploration Study (January, 2010)
The Spatial Exploration Study is a formal product of the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency (PBL). The study aims to analyze the regional developments in the fields of housing, employment and transport up to 2040.
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