# Portal:Infrastructure

Infrastructure Portal
 Welcome to Wikipedia's infrastructure portal, your gateway to the subject of infrastructure and its monumental importance for everyday society and the economy.

## Infrastructure Portal

State Street Bridge on the Chicago River in Chicago, Illinois.

Infrastructure generally refers to the basic physical structures and facilities, often government-owned, needed for the effective operation of a society or economy. They include the critical assets that are essential to enable, sustain, or enhance societal living conditions. More specifically, infrastructure facilitates the production of goods and services, the distribution of finished products to markets, and provision of basic social services such as schools and [hospitals. Public works and public capital are common terms for government-owned infrastructure. Examples of such infrastructure assets and facilities include the following:

## Selected article

New Jersey Transit AC locomotive.

An electric locomotive is a locomotive powered by electricity from overhead lines, a third rail or an on-board energy storage device (such as a chemical battery or fuel cell). Electrically propelled locomotives with on-board fuelled prime movers, such as diesel engines or gas turbines, are classed as diesel-electric or gas turbine electric locomotives because the electric generator/motor combination only serves as a power transmission system. Electricity is used to eliminate smoke and take advantage of the high efficiency of electric motors; however, the cost of railway electrification means that usually only heavily-used lines can be electrified.

One advantage of electrification is the lack of pollution from the locomotives themselves. Electrification also results in higher performance, lower maintenance costs and lower energy costs for electric locomotives. Power plants, even if they burn fossil fuels, are far cleaner than mobile sources such as locomotive engines. Also the power for electric locomotives can come from clean and/or renewable sources, including geothermal power, hydroelectric power, nuclear power, solar power and wind turbines. Power plant capacity is far greater than what any individual locomotive uses, so electric locomotives can have a higher power output than diesel locomotives and they can produce even higher short-term surge power for fast acceleration. Electric locomotives are ideal for commuter rail service with frequent stops.

An electric locomotive can be supplied with power from:

This is in marked contrast to a diesel-electric locomotive, which combines an onboard diesel engine with an electrical power transmission or store (battery, ultracapacitor) system.

The distinguishing design features of electric locomotives are:

• The type of electrical power used, either alternating current or direct current.
• The method for store (batteries, ultracapacitors) or collecting (transmission) electrical power.
• The means used to mechanically couple the traction motors to the driving wheels (drivers).

## Selected picture

The latest type of EMU on Beijing Subway Line No.1.

## Diagrams

 Graphical phases in the life cycle of a facility Public Vs. Private Provision Infrastructure Systems Cash Flow

## Selected biography

John Augustus Roebling (born Johann August Röbling, June 12, 1806 in Mühlhausen – July 22, 1869) was a German-born American civil engineer. He is famous for his wire rope suspension bridge designs, in particular, the design of the Brooklyn Bridge. Recognizing his intelligence at a young age, Roebling's mother, Friederike Dorothea Roebling arranged for him to be tutored in mathematics and science at Erfurt by Ephraim Salomon Unger. He went to Erfurt when he was 15. In 1824 he passed his Surveyor's examination and returned home for a year. In 1824 he enrolled for two semesters at the Bauakademie in Berlin where he studied architecture and engineering under Martin Friedrich Rabe (1765–1856), bridge construction and foundation construction under Johann Friedrich Dietlein (1782–1837), hydraulics under Johann Albert Eytelwein (1764–1848), and languages. In 1825 Roebling got a government job at Arnsberg, Westphalia, working on military road building for four years. During this period he made sketches for suspension bridges. In 1829 he returned to his home to work out his final thesis and prepare for his second engineer examination. For unknown reasons, he never took the examination.

In 1867 Roebling started design work on what is now called the Brooklyn Bridge, spanning the East River in New York. One day in 1869 he was standing at the edge of a dock, working on fixing the location where the bridge would be built, when his foot was crushed by an arriving ferry. His injured toes were amputated. He refused further medical treatment and wanted to cure his foot by "water therapy" (continuous pouring of water over the wound). His condition deteriorated. He succumbed to tetanus 24 days after the accident. Read more...

## Economic Analysis

${\displaystyle \scriptstyle ratio={\frac {PV(B_{2})-PV(B_{1})}{PV(C_{2})-PV(C_{1})}}}$
${\displaystyle \scriptstyle EAC={\frac {NPV}{A_{t,r}}}}$
${\displaystyle \scriptstyle FV=PV\cdot (1+i)^{n}}$
${\displaystyle \scriptstyle NPV=\sum _{n=0}^{N}{\frac {C_{n}}{(1+r)^{n}}}=0}$
${\displaystyle \scriptstyle \mathrm {PV} ={\frac {FV}{(1+i)^{n}}}\,}$
${\displaystyle \scriptstyle ROI={\frac {Profit}{Investment}}\ }$

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