A mass evacuation modeling framework to account for vulnerabilities in staged evacuation

Abstract

This study develops a framework for mass evacuation modeling that considers staged evacuation in response to an impending hurricane for testing and evaluation. The study follows two-stage modeling processes: (1) developing a fuzzy logic-based staged evacuation model that informs staged evacuation scenario building process, and (2) developing a traffic microsimulation model to test and evaluate staged evacuation scenarios. The staged evacuation model ascertains a vulnerability-based zonal prioritization while accounting for geophysical, social, and mobility challenges utilizing the vulnerability-index. Simulation results suggest that average travel time in staged evacuation decreases by 39.5% compared to evacuation without any countermeasure applied. The staged evacuation process demonstrates a decrease of 0.3–4.8 h in clearance time for most zones. The application of vulnerability-index for prioritization enables an efficient evacuation of high-risk areas. For example, Downtown-district is prioritized due to high vulnerability-index yielding a 2.8-hour decrease in clearance time for 50% of downtown-zones. The results will help emergency professionals understand the necessity of incorporating priority needs of vulnerable populations into staged evacuation implementation, testing, and evaluation.