We outline the history, significance, and impact of four important contributions by Canadian researchers to stochastic modeling for operational research: the use of the uniformization method to compute transient probabilities for Markov chains, pioneered by Winfried K. Grassmann, contributions...

Using administrative data for high-priority calls in Calgary, Alberta, we estimate how ambulance travel times depend on distance. We find that a logarithmic transformation produces symmetric travel-time distributions with heavier tails than those of a normal distribution. Guided by nonparametric...