The Effect of Shadow Evacuation in Megaregion Disasters: A Pilot Study

Strategic emergency plans are essential to protect the health and safety of the public under a disaster threat. The time to evacuate officially declared evacuation zones may be affected by the demand not only within these zones but also in lower-risk areas. This is because some proportion of the population in proximity to the official evacuation zones are also likely to evacuate. The evacuation of areas that do not receive an official evacuation notice is referred to as shadow evacuation. Shadow evacuation could increase the overall clearance times of declared evacuation zones (Weinisch and Brueckner, 2015) which is important to be considered during the emergency planning process. Although there is a raised awareness on the existence of shadow evacuation, further research is needed to better understand the impact of shadow evacuation on the clearance process as it pertains to the spatial-temporal distribution of shadow evacuations. Therefore, this research will use traffic simulation tools to assess the impact of shadow evacuation on the overall clearance time. This research is a pilot study conducted in a small portion of a megaregion. It is expected that future studies can build upon this research to include the simulation of entire megaregions and allow for strategic emergency planning guidance based on the potential impact of shadow evacuations in megaregions.

Project

• Status: Completed
• Funding: $125400
• Contract Numbers:

  69A3551747135

• Sponsor Organizations:

  Department of Transportation

  Office of the Assistant Secretary for Research and Technology
  1200 New Jersey Avenue, SE
  Washington, DC  United States  20590

  Office of the Assistant Secretary for Research and Technology

  University Transportation Centers Program
  Department of Transportation
  Washington, DC  United States  20590

  University Transportation Center Program

  1200 New Jersey Avenue, SE
  Washington, DC  United States  20590
• Managing Organizations:

  Department of Transportation

  1200 New Jersey Avenue, SE
  Washington, DC  United States  20590

  Office of the Assistant Secretary for Research and Technology

  Department of Transportation
  1200 New Jersey Avenue, SE
  Washington, DC  United States  20590

  University Transportation Center Program

  1200 New Jersey Avenue, SE
  Washington, DC  United States  20590
• Project Managers:

  Stearns, Amy

• Performing Organizations:

  Center for Cooperative Mobility for Competitive Megaregions

  University of Texas at Austin
  Austin, TX  United States  78712
• Principal Investigators:

  Wolshon, Brian

• Start Date: 20170901
• Expected Completion Date: 20180901
• Actual Completion Date: 0
• USDOT Program: University Transportation Centers Program

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Disaster preparedness; Disasters and emergency operations; Evacuation; Pilot studies; Regions; Traffic simulation; Transportation planning
• Subject Areas: Operations and Traffic Management; Planning and Forecasting; Safety and Human Factors; Security and Emergencies; Transportation (General);

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01650958
• Record Type: Research project
• Source Agency: Center for Cooperative Mobility for Competitive Megaregions
• Contract Numbers: 69A3551747135
• Files: UTC, RiP
• Created Date: Nov 15 2017 1:49PM