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Urban streets exhibit a hierarchical structure. From a network analysis perspective, continuity of streets based on the interior angle between street segments can be used to define ‘natural streets’ or ‘strokes’. The length of these ‘strokes’ can then be used to generate a hierarchy of street network. While researchers have described methods for defining such strokes and released tools that enable such analysis, the existing tools are dependent on proprietary applications and only an outline of the algorithm is available in the literature. This paper addresses these limitations and advances past approaches by (a) describing an efficient algorithm ‘COINS’ for conducting street continuity and hierarchy analysis and (b) releasing the python script and QGIS plugin which will enable users to implement this analysis independent of proprietary software and enable automation to process multiple datasets. The paper demonstrates the application of this tool using street network data from OpenStreetMap for 10 Indian cities and two international ones. Results indicate that our algorithm can detect the skeletal structure of a city which is visually very similar to the OpenStreetMap user-generated hierarchy, both at the city level and at the neighbourhood level. Analysing the results from 10 Indian cities using log–log plots of stroke length and stroke rank, we find that the strokes appear to follow Zipf’s law, but only in the mid-range of stroke lengths. Consistent with existing literature, we see that in our sample of Indian cities also there is a strong deviation from Zipf’s law for strokes that are approximately 100 m or lower.

In most urban areas, buses are the most heavily used form of public transportation[1] and more so in Indian cities where buses make up for over 90% of public transport ridership[2]. In the selected Indian metro cities, where formal bus based PT systems are operated by public agencies, they are over-reliant on state support to sustain operations as fare box collections are inadequate in spite of having relatively high ridership. The main challenge for all this is to achieve long term financial sustainability of public transport systems while providing good quality and affordable bus services.This paper investigates internal and external factors that led to the steep and recurrent fare increases in the Bangalore city bus services in the period from 2012–2014 which are operated by Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corporation. In order to estimate the impact of the recent bus fare increases that have had on the economically weaker sections of the society dependent on these services, the paper presents the results of a random sampling survey study carried out in a central locality in the city that has a large slum area.The key findings throw light on the various ways in which the low income bus users have adapted to reduce their travel costs through changes in travel behavior, travel pattern and modal shifts. The cost of the behavioral changes through lost opportunities and the cost of the modal shifts of the persons earlier favoring public transportation draw attention to the significance of public transport fare policies. Furthermore, the management and operations of the BMTC agency show scope for improvement which can translate into better revenue generation and consequent reduction in fares.

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Tatipamula et al.: Biological profile of R. leiodeaThe chemical investigation of acetone extract of manglicolous lichen Ramalina leiodea yielded three known metabolites, methyl 2,6-dihydroxy-4-methyl benzoate (1), haematommic acid (2) and ethyl haematommate (3), which are reported for the first time in this species. The acetone extract and the metabolites (1-3) were screened for antioxidant activity in α,α-diphenyl-β-picrylhydrazyl, 2,2'-azino-bis(3-ethylbenzothiazoline-6-sulphonic acid) and superoxide free radical assays, for antiinflammatory activity in pretein denaturation assay and for anticancer activity in sulforhodamine B assay on lung, head and neck, and cervical cancer cells. The results showed that compounds 2 and 3 depicted inhibitory profiles against 2,2'-azino-bis (3-ethylbenzothiazoline-6-sulphonic acid) free radical with an IC 50 of 40.0 and 40.5 µg/ml, respectively and caused protein denaturation with an IC 50 of 435 and 403 µg/ml, respectively. Furthermore, compounds 2 and 3 exhibited a significant degree of specificity against cervical, head and neck, and lung cancer cells, while these compounds showed little toxicity against normal human mammary epithelial cell line. In summary the manglicolous lichen Ramalina leiodea possessed free radical scavenging, antiinflammatory, and anticancer activities and the main metabolites responsible for these activities could be compounds 2 and 3.