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Counties in the twenty-first century are enigmatic hybrids of state and local government. Behaving sometimes as agents of state government, sometimes as county governments, and increasingly as municipal governments, urban counties are becoming more relevant as deliverers of urban services. Studies of county government have long recognized two roles of counties: as service delivery arms of state government and as local governments. More recently, analyses of county activities have pointed to increasing involvement in the delivery of services typically left to cities, particularly in urbanized areas. The rise of counties' municipal services role deserves greater attention. Using a two-year, in-depth analysis of Los Angeles County, the authors examine the extent to which L.A. County has increased its municipal presence. They find that this municipal, or urban, services role comprises a significant portion of Los Angeles County's activities and takes several distinct forms.

The current focus of transportation policy around disruptive events is to adopt an engineering resilience-oriented approach, which focuses on returning assets to good workable order as soon as possible. This will remain critically important in the future to reduce the scale and severity of disruptive events which are likely to become more commonplace in many locations due to climate change. It is, however, only one part of ensuring that such events have more limited impacts on society and the economy. A broader consideration of societal resilience and responses outside the transport sector is needed. People travel in order to take part in activities (work, education, caring and so on), and a smarter resilience response requires us to better understand these activity patterns and intervene accordingly. There is significant adaptive capacity within society that could be better harnessed to reduce the impacts of disruptive events. The work also shows that many of our assumptions about the short and long run impacts of disruptive events need re-examining to get a fuller picture of the true economic effects of disruptive events on society and the economy. Without this it will be difficult to make the case for many types of resilience investment. This briefing paper presents evidence collected from new studies of behavioural adaptation during disruptive events and uses this to identify four areas for action to improve how we plan for resilience and how we assess the worth of different types of investment strategy: 1. The development of Smart Resilience Strategies - which are a combination of transport and non-transport responses which work together to minimize the impacts of temporary infrastructure loss; 2. Measures to improve the usefulness, impact and co-ordination of communications with the public and businesses during disruptions, enabling social adaptation and reducing time wasted in unnecessarily perilous and extended journeys; 3. A continued programme of developing the capacity of travellers and businesses to adapt to different events through greater multi-modality and an increase in smart and flexible working practices; and 4. A reassessment of the approach to understanding the economic impacts of disruptive events which extends well beyond the apparent reductions in flows and increases in journey times observed on the networks and captures the societal and economic impacts in a more holistic way.

This article discusses a problem that has received scant attention in literature: microtargeted propaganda by foreign actors. Microtargeting involves collecting information about people, and using that information to show them targeted political advertisements. Such microtargeting enables advertisers to target ads to specific groups of people, for instance people who visit certain websites, forums, or Facebook groups. This article focuses on one type of microtargeting: microtargeting by foreign actors. For example, Russia has targeted certain groups in the US with ads, aiming to sow discord. Foreign actors could also try to influence European elections, for instance by advertising in favour of a certain political party. Foreign propaganda possibilities existed before microtargeting. This article explores two questions. In what ways, if any, is microtargeted propaganda by foreign actors different from other foreign propaganda? What could lawmakers in Europe do to mitigate the risks of microtargeted propaganda?

This article discusses a problem that has received scant attention in literature: microtargeted propaganda by foreign actors. Microtargeting involves collecting information about people, and using that information to show them targeted political advertisements. Such microtargeting enables advertisers to target ads to specific groups of people, for instance people who visit certain websites, forums, or Facebook groups. This article focuses on one type of microtargeting: microtargeting by foreign actors. For example, Russia has targeted certain groups in the US with ads, aiming to sow discord. Foreign actors could also try to influence European elections, for instance by advertising in favour of a certain political party. Foreign propaganda possibilities existed before microtargeting. This article explores two questions. In what ways, if any, is microtargeted propaganda by foreign actors different from other foreign propaganda? What could lawmakers in Europe do to mitigate the risks of microtargeted propaganda?

The guide, produced by a consortium comprising TRL and partners from academia and the commercial transport industry, on behalf of the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) describes how various factors influence the demand for public transport. The new guide updates the 1980 TRL publication ?The Demand for Public Transport? and should provide a vital reference source to key stakeholders, such as public transport operators and central and local government. In 1980 the then Transport and Road Research Laboratory, now TRL, published the original international collaborative report which for over twenty years has been the seminal piece of work on demand evaluation in setting out the factors affecting public transport patronage at the time. However the values of many of the parameters under consideration have changed, new methodologies and concepts have emerged and the institutional, socio-economic, environmental and legal framework is substantially different. In reviewing the publication, TRL worked with science based partners, the Transport Studies Unit - University of Oxford ; Institute for Transport Studies - University of Leeds ; Transport Studies Group - University of Westminster and the Centre for Transport Studies - University College London. Industrial based support came from The Association of Train Operating Companies, the Confederation of Passenger Transport, the Rees Jeffreys Road Fund, the Greater Manchester Public Transport Executive and public transport operators. Analysis and research by using primary and secondary data sources on the factors influencing the demand for public transport was pursued to produce a document that assists in identifying cost-effective schemes for improving services. The project involved the identification of data sources and initial analysis of overall trends in the bus and rail industries in Britain , and the analysis of the effects of fares, service quality, incomes, car ownership, land use, population, employment and wider transport policies on public transport demand.