Evaluation of Transportation Network Performance Under Evacuation Scenarios

Several major disasters have occurred in the United States and impacted coastal and river valley communities. The economic and societal impact of such disasters have demonstrated a need for better emergency planning, response, recovery, and adaptation. Through the understanding of the behavior, characteristics of past events, much informed decisions can be make. This study will utilize data from Hurricane Irma (2017) to compare traffic characteristics during the evacuation with those observed during routine non-emergency operations. The 2017 evacuation of Hurricane Irma has been referred to as the largest evacuation in the history of the nation with approximately 6.5 million Floridians under mandatory or voluntary evacuation orders. The present research will be focusing on the evacuation process of the coastal communities in the Florida Keys. This research seeks to better understand the evacuation process of Coastal and River Valley communities in the Florida Keys, FL to assist in the planning, mitigation, response, recovery, and adaptation of these areas from disasters. It is also expected that the findings from this research can be applied to evacuations of any hazard type or location