RSAI members from all over the world have in the past year participated in an extensive series of dedicated sessions (in Europe, Asia, America) on the ‘New Urban World’ ( http://www.ires.ma/en/meetings-and-debates/future-challenges-new-urban-world-what-model-development-moroccan-city). The main coordinators of this novel initiative were Karima Kourtit, Peter Nijkamp and Mark Partridge, strongly supported by the RSAI secretariat and supraregional and national sections. On the occasion of the ERSA meeting in Bratislava (August 2012) an extensive prime-time television interview with Peter Nijkamp on this initiative was broadcasted. A link to this tv interview – and a related newspaper interview – can be found on  http://www.ta3.com/clanok/1004665/host-v-studiu-peter-nijkamp-ake-budu-mesta-v-buducnosti.html.

Migration Studies, a brand new journal dedicated to advancing our understanding of human migration in all its manifestations, is now welcoming article submissions.

If your work is methodological, comparative or theoretical in scope and likely to make a difference in the field, submit it now!

Click here for more information:

 http://www.oxfordjournals.org/our_journals/migration/migration_studies_launch.html

We have great pleasure in informing you that Roberta Capello has received a doctorate honoris causa from the University of Vest in Timisoara on Monday, 29 October 2012.

Professor Boyce was honored with a special award on the 50th anniversary of the Japan Section of the RSAI for his paper, "Predicting Road Traffic Route Flows Uniquely for Urban Transportation Planning, " published in the  Studies in Regional Science, vol.42, no.1, The 50th Anniversary Special Issue.

Dr. David Boyce is an expert of transportation planning. He has been solong time engaged in practical urban transportation planning in large urbanareas including Chicago in US as well as he has actively participated ininternational scholarly meetings of regional science, transportation planning,urban and regional planning, and so on.

The traffic assignment model, which was developed by him and his heirsin the field of Transportation Engineering, had a great affect on practice andtheory in the field of urban transportation planning in Japan in 1970’s. Themethodology was based on stochastic probability theory. In this sense, at thebeginning it was taken as extraneous one from the view point of economistsbecause their methodology is, on the other hand, largely dependent on microdeterministic behavioral approach.

This paper has successfully improved traditional traffic route assignmentmethodology through introduction of concept of entropy and potentialfunction into the traditional route assignment model, and has provided arobust theoretical basis for the developed methodology by showing marginalconditions for equilibrium traffic flows at all links. It is more consistent withmicro behavioral approach traditionally adopted by the economists.

Dear all,

The new RSAI Newsletter November 2012 can now be found under

 http://www.regionalscience.org/Publications/RSAI-Newsletters/

Dear colleagues,

It is an enormous pleasure to inform you that RPER has been accepted for indexation in Scopus. This is an important step in RPER’s life because it means the strengthening of our international acknowledge, although we are proud to claim that we are as well a Portuguese journal. Please, spread this good new as widely as possible, among your collaborators and research team. Although the RPER main scope is the Portuguese regional reality, we are keen to publish other contributions whenever they are important to international regional science.

Kind regards,

 http://www.apdr.pt/siteRPER/EN/homeEN.html

The top professor at VU University Amsterdam never stops studying.

Always curious about things he doesn't understand, Peter Nijkamp is continually taking up new research topics - which often develop into flourishing fields of science. And when he has mastered them, the leading economist turns his gaze in yet another direction.

Peter Nijkamp (born in 1946) would like to be a student again. Law, maybe, biology, or history. And yet, as the first university professor at VU University Amsterdam, he seems to be right at the other end of the scale. This spatial economist is at the very peak of the pyramid. He has more freedom than other professors, more research funding and no administrative or teaching obligations.

In fact, this set-up does allow Peter Nijkamp to remain something of a student. One who has always worked hard because everything was so interesting, and now has a bit more free time to devote to the topics that really fascinate him. Not a bad position for someone with the wide range of interests he has. Thanks to his reputation, people keep on turning up with exciting new jobs. "You'd be astonished at the vast array of things that get presented to me every day," he says.

"Fortunately, I have no trouble switching from one topic to another. I'm a real workaholic, but my interests cover a wide field of science and policy, and I couldn't be happier in my work." He doesn't need much sleep, is often the first to turn up in the morning and finds it difficult to tear himself away in the evening even after everyone else is long gone.

Read full interview with Peter Nijkamp

( http://www.vu.nl/en/Images/Engels%20interview%20Nijkamp_tcm12-310080.pdf)

History of the Japan Section written by Professor Kohno and Professor Kurashimo