Joint Evacuation and Emergency Traffic Management Model with Consideration of Emergency Response Needs

During and after a disaster, transportation network management is a complex task. In a state of limited serviceability and functionality, surviving transportation infrastructure is expected to act as a vital lifeline and to support different types of operations. This study investigates the joint planning of evacuation operations and emergency traffic management while accounting for emergency response needs. Extended wildfires across a highway network are the assumed disaster setting. Population evacuation takes place by using part of the network, whereas emergency traffic management strategies are applied outside the evacuation zone. Network performance enhancement is pursued through the implementation of lane reversal. The problem is formulated as a two-stage optimization model; minimization of total evacuation time (TET) and minimization of total network travel time (TNTT) are the upper-level objectives for the evacuation area and the rest of the network, respectively. The lower level corresponds to a traffic assignment model on the basis of user equilibrium. Demonstration of the model on a real-world network proves the computational efficiency of the algorithm. The model systematically produces robust results in terms of TET-TNTT minimization and thus addresses the operational needs arising and enhances overall transportation network performance.