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Book Modeling Hurricane Evacuation Traffic

Download or read book Modeling Hurricane Evacuation Traffic written by Chester G. Wilmot and published by . This book was released on 2006 with total page 48 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The test was conducted by estimating the models on a portion of evacuation data from South Carolina following Hurricane Floyd, and then observing how well the models reproduced destination choice at the county level on the remaining data. The tests showed the models predicted destination choice on the remaining data with similar accuracy. The Gravity Model predicted evacuation to friends or relatives in 110 different counties with an average error of 1.55 evacuations over all destinations, while the corresponding error for the IOM was 1.64. For evacuation to hotels or motels in 70 different counties, the Gravity Model gave an average error of 1.48 evacuations and the IOM an average error of 1.50. However, when the IOM was modified to make the sequencing of opportunities sensitive to the direction of evacuation relative to the path of the storm, the modified IOM performed slightly better than the Gravity Model with average errors of 1.55 and 1.43 evacuations to friends and relatives, and motels and hotels, respectively. The transferability of the Gravity Model for evacuations to friends and relatives was also tested in this study by applying the model estimated on the Hurricane Floyd data in South Carolina to data from Hurricane Andrew in Louisiana. Transferability was tested by comparing the trip length frequency distributions from the two data sets, the similarity of friction factors from models estimated on each data set, and the ratio of the Root-Mean Square-Error (RMSE) of destination predictions of a locally-estimated model to a transferred model on the Andrew data. No significant statistical difference was found between the trip length frequency diagrams or the sets of friction factors at the 95 percent level of significance. The ratio of RMSEs on the Andrew data was 0.67, indicating that the average error of a locally-estimated model was 67 percent that of the transferred model.

Book Handbook of OR MS Models in Hazardous Materials Transportation

Download or read book Handbook of OR MS Models in Hazardous Materials Transportation written by Rajan Batta and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-06-06 with total page 297 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration of the U.S. Department of Transportation defines hazardous materials (hazmat) as a substance or material capable of posing an unreasonable risk to health, safety, or property when transported in commerce. Hazmat accidents can result in significant impact to the population (death, injuries) and damage to the environment (destroyed or damaged buildings and infrastructure). Further, hazmat, especially explosive materials, can potentially be used by terrorists to attack civilians or to destroy critical infrastructure. This handbook provides models from Operations Research and Management Science that study various activities involving hazmat transportation: risk assessment, route planning, location decisions, evacuation planning, and emergency planning for terrorist attacks. There are two important research areas in hazmat transportation that are widely studied in the literature: risk assessment and shipment planning. In the risk assessment area, important issues include measurement of accident probabilities and consequences in hazmat transport. Example works in the risk assessment area include modeling risk probability distribution over given areas, considering hazmat types and transport modes, and environmental conditions. The first half of this handbook covers the two fields of risk assessment and shipment planning, while the second half of this handbook provides useful models and insights on other important issues including location problems for undesirable facilities, network interdiction, terrorist attack, and evacuation.

Book Large Scale Evacuation

Download or read book Large Scale Evacuation written by Michael K. Lindell and published by CRC Press. This book was released on 2018-12-07 with total page 327 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Large-Scale Evacuation introduces the reader to the steps involved in evacuation modelling for towns and cities, from understanding the hazards that can require large-scale evacuations, through understanding how local officials decide to issue evacuation advisories and households decide whether to comply, to transportation simulation and traffic management strategies. The author team has been recognized internationally for their research and consulting experience in the field of evacuations. Collectively, they have 125 years of experience in evacuation, including more than 140 projects for federal and state agencies. The text explains how to model evacuations that use the road transportation network by combining perspectives from social scientists and transportation engineers, fields that have commonly approached evacuation modelling from distinctly different perspectives. In doing so, it offers a step-by-step guide through the key questions needed to model an evacuation and its impacts to the evacuation route system as well as evacuation management strategies for influencing demand and expanding capacity. The authors also demonstrate how to simulate the resulting traffic and evacuation management strategies that can be used to facilitate evacuee movement and reduce unnecessary demand. Case studies, which identify key points to analyze in an evacuation plan, discuss evacuation termination and re-entry, and highlight challenges that someone developing an evacuation plan or model should expect, are also included. This textbook will be of interest to researchers, practitioners, and advanced students.

Book Handbook of Emergency Response

Download or read book Handbook of Emergency Response written by Adedeji B. Badiru and published by CRC Press. This book was released on 2013-08-22 with total page 762 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Despite preemptive preparations, disasters can and do occur. Whether natural disasters, catastrophic accidents, or terrorist attacks, the risk cannot be completely eliminated. A carefully prepared response is your best defense. Handbook of Emergency Response: A Human Factors and Systems Engineering Approach presents practical advice and guidelines on how to plan the coordinated execution of emergency response. A useful tool to mitigate logistical problems that often follow disasters or extreme events, the core of this guide is the role of human factors in emergency response project management. The handbook provides a systematic structure for communication, cooperation, and coordination. It highlights what must be done and when, and how to identify the resources required for each effort. The book tackles cutting-edge research in topics such as evacuation planning, chemical agent sensor placement, and riverflow prediction. It offers strategies for establishing an effective training program for first responders and insightful advice in managing waste associated with disasters. Managing a project in the wake of a tragedy is complicated and involves various emotional, sentimental, reactive, and chaotic responses. This is the time that a structured communication model is most needed. Having a guiding model for emergency response can help put things in proper focus. This book provides that model. It guides you through planning for and responding to various emergencies and in overcoming the challenges in these tasks.

Book Advances in Geospatial Data Science

Download or read book Advances in Geospatial Data Science written by Rodrigo Tapia-McClung and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2022-05-17 with total page 205 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book presents a selection of manuscripts submitted to the 2nd International Conference on Geospatial Information Sciences 2021, a virtual conference held on November 3-5, 2021. These papers were selected by the Scientific Program Committee of the Conference after a rigorous peer-review process. They represent the vast scope of the interdisciplinary research areas that characterize the Geospatial Information Sciences that is done in the discipline. It especially represents a fabulous opportunity to showcase research carried out by young Mexican researchers and showcase it to the rest of the world and enhance the growth of the sciences in the country while, at the same time, enforces them to level up with other research at the international level.

Book Modeling Hurricane Evacuation Traffic

Download or read book Modeling Hurricane Evacuation Traffic written by Haoqiang Fu and published by . This book was released on 2006 with total page 146 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Little attention has been given to estimating dynamic travel demand in transportation planning in the past. However, when factors influencing travel are changing significantly over time - such as with an approaching hurricane - dynamic demand and the resulting variation in traffic flow on the network become important. In this study, dynamic travel demand models for hurricane evacuation were developed with two methodologies: survival analysis and sequential choice model. Using survival analysis, the time before evacuation from a pending hurricane is modeled with those that do not evacuate considered as censored observations. A Cox proportional hazards regression model with time-dependent variables and a Piecewise Exponential model were estimated. In the sequential choice model, the decision to evacuate in the face of an oncoming hurricane is considered as a series of binary choices over time. A sequential logit model and a sequential complementary log-log model were developed. Each model is capable of predicting the probability of a household evacuating at each time period before hurricane landfall as a function of the household's socio-economic characteristics, the characteristics of the hurricane (such as distance to the storm), and policy decisions (such as the issuing of evacuation orders). Three datasets were used in this study. They were data from southwest Louisiana collected following Hurricane Andrew, data from South Carolina collected following Hurricane Floyd, and stated preference survey data collected from the New Orleans area. Based on the analysis, the sequential logit model was found to be the best alternative for modeling dynamic travel demand for hurricane evacuation. The sequential logit model produces predictions which are superior to those of the current evacuation participation rate models with response curves. Transfer of the sequential logit model estimated on the Floyd data to the Andrew data demonstrated that the sequential logit model is capable of estimating dynamic travel demand in a different environment than the one in which it was estimated with reasonable accuracy. However, more study is required on the transferability of models of this type, as well as the development of procedures that would allow the updating of transferred model parameters to better reflect local evacuation behavior.

Book Large Scale Evacuation

Download or read book Large Scale Evacuation written by Michael K. Lindell and published by CRC Press. This book was released on 2018-12-07 with total page 347 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Large-Scale Evacuation introduces the reader to the steps involved in evacuation modelling for towns and cities, from understanding the hazards that can require large-scale evacuations, through understanding how local officials decide to issue evacuation advisories and households decide whether to comply, to transportation simulation and traffic management strategies. The author team has been recognized internationally for their research and consulting experience in the field of evacuations. Collectively, they have 125 years of experience in evacuation, including more than 140 projects for federal and state agencies. The text explains how to model evacuations that use the road transportation network by combining perspectives from social scientists and transportation engineers, fields that have commonly approached evacuation modelling from distinctly different perspectives. In doing so, it offers a step-by-step guide through the key questions needed to model an evacuation and its impacts to the evacuation route system as well as evacuation management strategies for influencing demand and expanding capacity. The authors also demonstrate how to simulate the resulting traffic and evacuation management strategies that can be used to facilitate evacuee movement and reduce unnecessary demand. Case studies, which identify key points to analyze in an evacuation plan, discuss evacuation termination and re-entry, and highlight challenges that someone developing an evacuation plan or model should expect, are also included. This textbook will be of interest to researchers, practitioners, and advanced students.

Book Development of a Mode Choice Model to Estimate Evacuation Transit Demand

Download or read book Development of a Mode Choice Model to Estimate Evacuation Transit Demand written by Chester G. Wilmot and published by . This book was released on 2019 with total page 67 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Since Hurricane Katrina, transit evacuation service has been seen to serve critical needs in affected cities and an increasing number of hurricanes have struck the east coast where more people rely on public transportation to evacuate. Thus, it is important to model mode choice in evacuation for a better estimation of evacuation transit demand. In this study, a joint mode and destination type choice model was estimated based on multiple post-storm behavioral surveys from the northeastern seaboard to the Gulf Coast. A nested logit model specification was used to estimate this joint choice model. The estimated model showed significant linkage between mode and destination type choice, which validated the choice of a nested structure for the model. Selected variables include both household and zonal characteristics, reflecting the attributes of alternatives, the characteristics of households, and the interactions between them. Most of the selected variables are significant at a confidence level of 95%. The estimated model was then applied in two different cases and the prediction errors are small. This study also estimated a new model in a situation that zonal data is only available at a relatively coarse level. The new estimated model was applied in three different cases. The prediction errors in all cases are larger in comparison with the previous applications, but they are still within an acceptable range. Overall, the findings of this study provide insight into the factors affecting mode and destination type choice of residents during hurricane evacuation. It also provides discussion on model transferability in applications with different characteristics.

Book Hurricane Evacuation Modeling

Download or read book Hurricane Evacuation Modeling written by Lei Fang (Engineer) and published by . This book was released on 2013 with total page 119 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Hurricane evacuation has attracted renewed emphasis since hurricane Katrina in 2005. Every coastal state is establishing their evacuation guidelines and searching new methods to improve evacuations. In this dissertation, first, hurricane evacuation of the Hampton Roads region of Virginia is investigated using large-scale regional mesoscopic traffic simulation models. Fourteen evacuation scenarios consisting of various combinations of storm categories and traffic control strategies are evaluated. The evaluation of scenarios provided information on the clearance time, average travel times, bottleneck locations, and congestion durations. The major findings from scenario evaluations include: (1) The differences in participation rates (100% versus 70%) did not impact the clearance times in a Category 1 storm evacuation, but have significant impact in a Category 3 storm evacuation, (2) The status (open or close) of a critical tunnel crossing, the Monitor-Merrimac Memorial Bridge-Tunnel did not have impact on the evacuation performance in Category 1 and 2 storm. However, opening the tunnel would improve the performance in a Category 3 storm, (3) The clearance times derived from simulations can be used to determine when to issue evacuation orders for various storm intensities, and (4) The bottleneck locations and durations identified for each evacuation scenario can be used to allocate the limited traffic monitoring equipment during an evacuation. The second focus of this dissertation is to investigate the impact of assumptions made regarding evacuee route choice on evacuation performance estimates. In the hurricane evacuation literature, very few studies have documented the realistic route choice behavior of evacuees during a hurricane. Due to this lack of realistic route choice behavior data, modelers make assumptions about the route choice behavior and traffic assignment. User-equilibrium traffic assignment has been extensively used in past evacuation studies. In this dissertation, realistic route choice behavior was determined by evaluating findings of a few published studies. The impact of route choice behavior on evacuation performance, especially travel times, is then investigated using the regional simulation model of the Hampton Roads region. The analysis found that the user-equilibrium traffic assignment significantly underestimates the travel times during an evacuation. The extent of underestimation of evacuation travel times depends on the total evacuation demand (a function of storm intensity), and the percent of evacuees willing to use en-route information to seek alternate routes when facing congestion. For the three en-route percentages reported in the literature i.e., 30%, 50%, and 70%, the UE travel times were 58%, 42%, and 33% lower than actual travel times realized in a Category 1; 94%, 71%, and 57% lower in a Category 2; and 90%, 69%, and 54% lower in a Category 3 evacuation. These findings illustrate the need to collect real-world data on evacuee route choice in order to build accurate evacuation models. The third focus of dissertation is to propose a procedure to assess the benefit of adding additional intermediate crossovers on a contra flow facility. Contra flow operation in which the direction of traffic on one or more travel lanes is reversed in order to increase the capacity of a road network is becoming a critical component of the evacuation plans of coastal states. Several coastal states have a contra flow plan in place for evacuation, however only a few states have intermediate crossovers between the origin and termination points. The impact of intermediate crossovers on network performance has not been well investigated in previous research. This dissertation investigates the benefits of having intermediate crossovers between regular and contra flow lanes. Based on the investigation, it can be concluded that adding intermediate crossovers did improve network performance for medium and high evacuation demand situations. Adding intermediate crossovers for low demand situations did not improve the network performance and thus any considerations for intermediate crossovers for the low demand evacuations must be based solely on providing access to road-side services (gas, food, and others). For high and medium demand situations and for the road network studied in this section, a 28% improvement in the average travel time was observed by deploying four intermediate crossovers out of the 44 potential crossover locations. The iterative elimination procedure proposed in this dissertation is the first attempt in the literature to provide a systematic approach to determine the critical intermediate crossover locations within reasonable computation times.

Book Hurricane Evacuation

Download or read book Hurricane Evacuation written by Vinayak V. Dixit and published by . This book was released on 2008 with total page 154 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Book Modeling Tourist s Evacuation Decision While at the Destination

Download or read book Modeling Tourist s Evacuation Decision While at the Destination written by Ignatius Pulung Dwi Cahyanto and published by . This book was released on 2012 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The purpose of this study was to examine the role of tourists' individual characteristics, travel related variables, information search and risk appraisal in influencing their voluntary evacuation in the event of a hurricane. Three interrelated research questions framed this study (1) What are the relationships between tourists' individual characteristics, travel related variables, demographics and their hurricane evacuation decisions? (2) What are the relationships between tourists' past experience with hurricane impacts, their involvement with hurricanes, their hurricane knowledge, their personality, their risk belief associated with hurricanes and their information search behavior regarding hurricane evacuation? (3) What are the relationships between tourists' past experience with hurricane impacts, their involvement with hurricanes, their hurricane knowledge, their personality, their risk belief associated with hurricanes, their information search behavior regarding hurricane evacuation, with risk appraisal and evacuation decision?

Book Design of Strategic Evacuations with Conventional and Self driving Vehicles

Download or read book Design of Strategic Evacuations with Conventional and Self driving Vehicles written by Jooyong Lee (Ph. D. in civil engineering) and published by . This book was released on 2021 with total page 284 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This dissertation delivers efficient strategies for evacuating Houston and Galveston neighborhoods in the Texas Gulf Coast to various safe destinations. Effective network assignment and vehicle-operation strategies are pursued to maximize evacuation efficiency and improve regional resilience to various threats. Behavioral characteristics of evacuees and modeling techniques for traffic flows are investigated via large-scale modeling tools for complex regions. Intermodal evacuation (bringing carless and other vulnerable residents to evacuation buses) is also analyzed. In Chapter 3, this dissertation presents an efficient evacuation plan that minimizes all coastal residents’ total travel time and late-arrival costs (at 8 regional exit points or shelters), while reflecting dynamic road closures that mimic the 2017 Hurricane Harvey flooding events. With different penetration rates of privately-owned self-driving or “autonomous” vehicles (AVs), each household’s efficient departure time choices are estimated upstream, in an aggregated model using genetic algorithms. That model relies on a bi-level algorithm, where the upper level searches for departure time schedules, and the lower level evaluates such choices via an agent-based transportation simulation across the region’s detailed roadway network. Higher AV penetration rate results in more favorable evacuation conditions, thanks to greater evacuation order compliance and smaller inter-vehicle headways. Chapter 4 models coastal Houstonites’ evacuation decisions in a disaggregate fashion, reflecting each evacuee’s home location, surrounding traffic conditions, while relying on cumulative prospect theory (CPT) for households’ departure time and destination choices. Recognizing both panicked and patient evacuees’ preference functions, results illustrate how more patient evacuees deliver lower traffic congestion, arrive at more distant inland destinations, and stagger their departures to prioritize the most distant (from shelters) residents first. Similar departure-time and destination choice models based on multinomial logit (MNL) specifications were then used to compare evacuation conditions to those emerging under a CPT framework. Comparison of CPT and MNL model results highlight how the CPT assumptions can better reflect evacuee decision-making under uncertainty, which can lead to an analyst preference for CPT over MNL. Finally, in Chapter 5, shared autonomous vehicles (SAVs) are used to provide a first-mile connection to evacuation buses for those residing in zero-car or insufficient vehicles owned households. Various SAV fleet size scenarios, along with SAV seating, dynamic ride-sharing (DRS) strategies, and evacuee behavioral assumptions are simulated to evaluate this setup’s evacuation efficiency and performance. In terms of cost-effectiveness, one 5-seat SAV per 14 (carless) residents is recommended. Ride-sharing coordination between the SAVs and larger (37-seat) evacuation buses is a good option if evacuees are willing to wait for the SAVs to arrive in a DRS-coordinated way. Carless evacuees’ unwillingness to share rides in SAVs (for first-mile services to evacuation buses) had a more negative impact on total evacuation costs than those who make decisions in a more panicked way

Book Where the Weather Meets the Road

Download or read book Where the Weather Meets the Road written by National Research Council and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2004-03-31 with total page 189 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Weather has broad and significant effects on the roadway environment. Snow, rain, fog, ice, freezing rain, and other weather conditions can impair the ability of drivers to operate their vehicles safely, significantly reduce roadway capacity, and dramatically increase travel times. Multiple roadway activities, from roadway maintenance and construction to shipping, transit, and police operations, are directly affected by inclement weather. Some road weather information is available to users currently, however a disconnect remains between current research and operations, and additional research could yield important safety and economic improvements for roadway users. Meteorology, roadway technology, and vehicle systems have evolved to the point where users could be provided with better road weather information through modern information technologies. The combination of these technologies has the potential to significantly increase the efficiency of roadway operations, road capacity, and road safety. Where the Weather Meets the Road provides a roadmap for moving these concepts to reality.