Citation

Shahhoseini Z, Sarvi M. Transp. Res. B Methodol. 2019; 122: 57-87.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2019, Elsevier Publishing)

DOI

10.1016/j.trb.2019.01.019

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

The motion dynamics of humans in crowded built environments during evacuations are impacted by individuals' interactions with the physical environment particularly when the geometric space of the movement is restrictive. Controlled laboratory experiments have recently been employed as a reliable data provision approach in this field. Using this approach and based on data obtained from 54 experimental scenarios, this study investigates a range of questions in relation to the collective motion of pedestrian crowds in restricted shares spaces. This includes the role of the layout of the spatial constraints as well as the influence of the movement speed level in the evacuation performance of pedestrian facilities. We explored these questions particularly for dense crowds and based on both micro-scale and macro-scale measures of pedestrian traffic. Our analyses showed that traffic efficiency is demonstrably sensitive to the physical features of the merging passages as well as the desired speed level of the crowd. The patterns of influence of the geometric constraints on traffic efficiency were by and large common across all three speed regimes that we examined. Our results also showed that under specific geometric constraints, the formation of blockages (i.e., longer queue or longer time interval between the passage of two consecutive pedestrians) is more likely. An inspection of the trajectory patterns revealed that this could be attributable to the extent to which the two flows had to mix up with each other in order to be able to merge and share the space. Certain layouts, particularly symmetric layouts, allowed the two flows to keep their separate ways after the entered the shared space, whereas other setups engendered a more noticeable mixture of movement trajectories in order for the two flows to be able to travel through the shared area. The findings have applications for the design of safe passageways when dense crowd flows enter restrictive areas.

Language: en

Keywords

Collective motion; Crowd dynamics; Geometric/architectural flow optimisation; Merging flows; Pedestrian crowd experiment; Pedestrian traffic flow