An operational research-based integrated approach for mass evacuation planning of a city

Large-scale disasters are constantly occurring around the world, and in many cases evacuation of regions of city is needed. ‘Operational Research/Management Science’ (OR/MS) has been widely used in emergency planning for over five decades. Warning dissemination, evacuee transportation and shelter management are three ‘Evacuation Support Functions’ (ESF) generic to many hazards. This thesis has adopted a case study approach to illustrate the importance of integrated approach of evacuation planning and particularly the role of OR/MS models. In the warning dissemination phase, uncertainty in the household’s behaviour as ‘warning informants’ has been investigated along with uncertainties in the warning system. An agentbased model (ABM) was developed for ESF-1 with households as agents and ‘warning informants’ behaviour as the agent behaviour. The model was used to study warning dissemination effectiveness under various conditions of the official channel. In the transportation phase, uncertainties in the household’s behaviour such as departure time (a function of ESF-1), means of transport and destination have been. Households could evacuate as pedestrians, using car or evacuation buses. An ABM was developed to study the evacuation performance (measured in evacuation travel time). In this thesis, a holistic approach for planning the public evacuation shelters called ‘Shelter Information Management System’ (SIMS) has been developed. A generic allocation framework of was developed to available shelter capacity to the shelter demand by considering the evacuation travel time. This was formulated using integer programming. In the sheltering phase, the uncertainty in household shelter choices (either nearest/allocated/convenient) has been studied for its impact on allocation policies using sensitivity analyses. Using analyses from the models and detailed examination of household states from ‘warning to safety’, it was found that the three ESFs though sequential in time, however have lot of interdependencies from the perspective of evacuation planning. This thesis has illustrated an OR/MS based integrated approach including and beyond single ESF preparedness. The developed approach will help in understanding the inter-linkages of the three evacuation phases and preparing a multi-agency-based evacuation planning evacuation

Calculating the balance between water resources and water demands:an approach using risk analysis

Predicting future need for water resources has traditionally been, at best, a crude mixture of art and science. This has prevented the evaluation of water need from being carried out in either a consistent or comprehensive manner. This inconsistent and somewhat arbitrary approach to water resources planning led to well publicised premature developments in the 1970's and 1980's but privatisation of the Water Industry, including creation of the Office of Water Services and the National Rivers Authority in 1989, turned the tide of resource planning to the point where funding of schemes and their justification by the Regulators could no longer be assumed. Furthermore, considerable areas of uncertainty were beginning to enter the debate and complicate the assessment It was also no longer appropriate to consider that contingencies would continue to lie solely on the demand side of the equation. An inability to calculate the balance between supply and demand may mean an inability to meet standards of service or, arguably worse, an excessive provision of water resources and excessive costs to customers. United Kingdom Water Industry Research limited (UKWlR) Headroom project in 1998 provided a simple methodology for the calculation of planning margins. This methodology, although well received, was not, however, accepted by the Regulators as a tool sufficient to promote resource development. This thesis begins by considering the history of water resource planning in the UK, moving on to discuss events following privatisation of the water industry post·1985. The mid section of the research forms the bulk of original work and provides a scoping exercise which reveals a catalogue of uncertainties prevalent within the supply-demand balance. Each of these uncertainties is considered in terms of materiality, scope, and whether it can be quantified within a risk analysis package. Many of the areas of uncertainty identified would merit further research. A workable, yet robust, methodology for evaluating the balance between water resources and water demands by using a spreadsheet based risk analysis package is presented. The technique involves statistical sampling and simulation such that samples are taken from input distributions on both the supply and demand side of the equation and the imbalance between supply and demand is calculated in the form of an output distribution. The percentiles of the output distribution represent different standards of service to the customer. The model allows dependencies between distributions to be considered, for improved uncertainties to be assessed and for the impact of uncertain solutions to any imbalance to be calculated directly. The method is considered a Significant leap forward in the field of water resource planning.