Abstract
How can a large building with many occupants be evacuated in minimum time, and where are the bottlenecks likely to occur in such an evacuation? In order to address this question, three network building evacuation models have been presented. It is believed that the models provide useful new tools for the analysis of building evacuability, and have the potential to facilitate the study of the interrelationships with building design, building redesign, and building evacuability.
Article PDF
Similar content being viewed by others
Avoid common mistakes on your manuscript.
References
Benjamin, I., Fung, F. and Roth, L., “Control of Smoke Movement in Buildings: A Review,” NBSIR 77-1209, Center for Fire Research, National Bureau of Standards, Washington, DC (1977).
Berlin, G. N., “EMBER: A Building Firesafety Evaluation System.” Modeling Systems, Inc., Boston, MA (1979).
Berlin, G. N., “A Modeling Procedure for Analyzing the Effect of Design on Emergency Escape Potential,” Modeling Systems, Inc., Boston, MA (1979).
Berlin, G. N., “The Use of Directed Routes for Assessing Escape Potential,” National Fire Protection Association, Batterymarch Park, Quincy, MA (1979).
Berlin, G. N., “A System for Describing the Expected Hazards of Building Fires,”Fire Safety Journal, Vol. 2, (1979/1980), pp. 181–189.
Bradley, G. H., Brown, G. G., and Graves, G. W., “Design and Implementation of Large-Scale Primal Transportation Algorithms,”Management Science, Vol. 24 (1977), pp. 1–34.
Brown, J. R., “The Sharing Problem,”Operations Research, Vol. 27, No. 2 (March–April 1979), pp. 324–340.
Brown, J. R., “The Knapsack Sharing Problem,”Operations Research, Vol. 27, No. 2 (March–April 1979), pp. 340–355.
Bryan, J. L., “Human Behavior in Fire: Bibliography,” Department of Fire Protection Engineering, University of Maryland, College Park, MD (1978).
Cooper, L. Y., “Estimating Safe Available Egress Time From Fires,” to appear as a National Bureau of Standards Information Report, Center for Fire Research, National Bureau of Standards, Washington, DC (1980).
Dantzig, G. B.,Linear Programming and Extensions, Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ (1963).
Design and Construction of Building Exits, Washington, DC, U.S. Department of Commerce, National Bureau of Standards, Misc. Publication M151 (1935).
Ford, L. R., Jr. and Fulkerson, D. R.,Flows in Networks, Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ (1962).
Francis, R. L. and Saunders, P. B., “EVACNET: Prototype Network Optimization Models for Building Evacuation,” NBSIR 79-1593, National Bureau of Standards, Washington, DC (1979).
Francis, R. L., “A Uniformity Principle for Evacuation Route Allocation,” submitted toJournal of Research of the National Bureau of Standards, Vol. 86, No. 5 (1981).
Francis, R. L., “A Simple Graphical Procedure to Estimate the Minimum Time to Evacuate a Building,” SFPE Technology Report 79-5, Society of Fire Prevention Engineers, Boston, MA, pp. 509–514.
Fruin, J. J.,Pedestrian Planning and Design, Metropolitan Association of Urban Designers and Environmental Planners, Inc., New York, NY (1971).
Halpern, J., “A Generalized Dynamic Flows Problem,”Networks, Vol. 9 (1979), pp. 133–167.
Jacobsen, S., “On Marginal Allocation in Single Constraint Min-Max Problems,”Management Science, Vol. 17, No. 11 (1971), pp. 780–783.
Jarvis, J. J. and Ratliff, H. D., “Some Equivalent Objectives for Dynamic Network Flow Problems,” to appear inManagement Science, Vol. 28, No. 1 (1982).
Johnson, B. M. and Pauls, J. L., “Study of Stair and Elevator Use in Jeanne Mance Building, Ottawa — An Interim Report,” National Research Council of Canada, Division of Building Research, Ottawa, Canada (1978).
Kang, M. K., “Dynamic Network Flow Models of Conveyor Systems,” Working Paper No. 5, Manufacturing Flow Research Project, Department of Industrial and Operations Engineering, The University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, March 1978 (supported in part under NSF-RANN Grant No. APR76-16709).
Martin-Vega, L. and Ratliff, H. D., “Scheduling Rules for Parallel Processors,” Research Report No. 76-9, Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL (May 1976).
Maxwell, W. L. and Wilson, R. C., “Dynamic Network Flow Modelling of Fixed Path Material Handling Systems,”ARE Transactions, Vol. 13, No. 1 (March 1981), pp. 12–21.
Merchant, D. K., and Nemhauser, G. L., “A Model and an Algorithm for the Dynamic Traffic Assignment Problems,”Transportation Science, Vol. 12, No. 2 (August 1978), pp. 183–199.
Merchant, D. K. and Nemhauser, G. L., “Optimality Conditions for a Dynamic Traffic Assignment Model,”Transportation Science, Vol 12, No. 2 (August 1978), pp. 200–207.
Minieka, J. L., “Maximal, Lexicographic and Dynamic Network Flows,”Operations Research, Vol. 12, No. 2 (March–April, 1973), pp. 517–527.
Pauls, J. L., “Movement of People in Building Evacuations,” Chapter 21 ofHuman Response to Tall Buildings, D. J. Conway (ed.), Strausburg, PA, Dowden, Hutchinson & Ross,Community Development Series, Vol. 34 (1977).
Pauls, J. L., “Management and Movement of Building Occupants in Emergencies,” National Research Council of Canada, Division of Building Research, NRCC 16845, DDR Paper No. 788, Ottawa, Canada (September 1977).
Pauls, J. L. and Jones, B. K., “Case Studies of Building Evacuations,” and “Building Evacuation Findings and Recommendations,” submitted for publication inBehavior in Fires, D. Canter (ed.), J. Wiley and Sons, Inc., New York, NY (1978).
Pauls, J. L., “Building Evacuation: Research Findings and Recommendations,” submitted for publication in the bookOn Behavior and Fires, D. Canter (ed.), J. Wiley and Sons, Inc., New York, NY. National Research Council of Canada, Division of Building Research, Ottawa, Canada, May 1978.
Pauls, J. L., “Evacuation of High Rise Office Buildings,”Buildings, Vol. 72, No. 5 (1978), pp. 84–88.
Porteus, E. L. and Yormark, J. S., “More on the Min-Max Allocation,”Management Science, Vol. 18, No. 9 (1972), pp. 502–507.
Predtechenskii, W. M. and Milinskii, A. I.,Personestrome in Gebauden, Rudolf Muller, Koln-Braunsfeld (1971).
Roytman, M. Y.,Principles of Fire Safety Standards in Building Construction, published for the National Bureau of Standards, Washington, DC by Amerind Publishing Co., Pvt. Ltd., New Delhi, India (1975).
Stahl, F. and Archea, J., “An Assessment of the Technical Literature on Emergency Egress from Buildings,” NBSIR 77-1313, National Bureau of Standards, Washington, DC (1977).
Stahl, F. I., “Simulating Human Behavior in High-Rise Building Fires: Modeling Occupant Movement Through a Fire-Floor From Initial Alert to Safe Egress,” NBS-GCR 77-92, National Bureau of Standards, Washington, DC (1977).
Tsui, L., “Dynaflo User’s Manual, ”Working Paper No. 7,“ Manufacturing Flow Research Project, Department of Industrial and Operations Engineering, The University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, October 1978 (supported in part under NSF-RANN Grant No. APR76-16709).
White, W. W., “Dynamic Transshipment Network: An Algorithm and Its Application to the Distribution of Empty Containers,Networks, Vol. 2 (1972), pp. 211–236.
Wilkenson, W. L., “An Algorithm for Universal Maximal Dynamic Flows in a Network,”Operations Research, Vol. 19, No. 7 (Nov.–Dec, 1971).
Wilkenson, W. L., “Min/Max Bounds for Dynamic Network Flows,”Naval Research Logistics Quarterly, Vol. 20, No. 3, 505–516, (Sept. 1973).
Williams, A. C., “Marginal Values in Linear Programming,”Journal of the Society of Industrial and Applied Mathematics, Vol. 11, No. 1, 82–94 (1963).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Additional information
Note: This research was supported in part by the Center for Fire Research, National Bureau of Standards, Grant No. NB79NAD0021, and by the Operations Research Division, National Bureau of Standards, U.S. Department of Commerce, Washington, DC.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Chalmet, L.G., Francis, R.L. & Saunders, P.B. Network models for building evacuation. Fire Technol 18, 90–113 (1982). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02993491
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02993491