Environmental parameters and analysis of crowd flow in an academic building of a university

Abstract

Academic buildings are the main gathering places in universities and colleges. The crowd flow could cause a change in environmental parameters of buildings. In other words, the change in environmental parameters in buildings can be somewhat reflective of the crowd flow. Therefore, field measurements of the crowd flow and environmental parameters in an academic building at a university were conducted in this study. During the periods of 7:30–8:00 and 13:20–13:50, the average speed of the crowd was the highest, which was about 1.2 m/s; the CO2 concentration was low, which was about 750 ppm. In the periods of 9:20–9:50 and 15:10–15:40, the average speed of people walking in the opposite directions was the lowest, which is 0.42 m/s; however, the CO2 concentration could reach 1800 ppm. Test results showed that the variations of CO2 concentrations were inversely related to the average speed of the crowd in the evacuation passage, except for the periods of 7:30–8:00 and 13:20–13:50. Spatial separation and physical separation could be used in the management of personnel flow in the academic building. The results may provide reference for the management of the crowd flow in similar academic buildings of other universities.

Pedestrian Arching Mechanism at Bottleneck in Subway Transit Hub

“…In recent years, pedestrian behavior has been a research focus [3,4]. Aiming at the reduction of pedestrian efficiency and safety caused by bottleneck, scholars began to study the pedestrian behavior characteristics at bottleneck.…”

“…Through field experiments, Sun et al [11] and Luo et al [12] studied the influence of bottleneck on pedestrian movement in subway stations, and proved some optimization measures such as funnel shape, column obstacle. In recent years, pedestrian behavior has been a research focus [3,4]. Aiming a reduction of pedestrian efficiency and safety caused by bottleneck, scholars beg study the pedestrian behavior characteristics at bottleneck.…”

Study on the relationship between the CO2 concentration and pedestrian flow in a building evacuation passageway

“…32,33 Moreover, variations in CO 2 concentrations were found to be inversely related to the average speed of the crowd in an evacuation passageway. 34 Can CO 2 , a human respiration product, be used to predict the flow of people in an evacuation passageway?…”

Investigating the Exits’ Symmetry Impact on the Evacuation Process of Classrooms and Lecture Halls: An Agent-Based Modeling Approach

“…The highest percentage of the fires, 45% of the cases, have been caused intentionally, while more than 80% of the total fires have been occurred between 6 a.m. and 6 p.m. when people were around [53,54]. While setting up a good emergency plan is among the major and necessarily functions for educational institutions in order to offer protection and timely response to such a situation [55], improving other aspects related to the evacuation process-such as constantly evaluating the emergency plans, a proper set up of the desks and chairs with the classroom, providing larger corridors and larger evacuation doors or a proper placement of these evacuation doors-can be of great importance [56][57][58].In this context, the current paper aims to analyze if the position of the exit doors has an impact on the evacuation time by considering situations in which the two evacuating doors are placed in a symmetrical and in a non-symmetrical/asymmetrical position. For this purpose, 18 situations have been considered, keeping in mind the architectural rules related to the closeness of the doors inside a room and that not any of the possible doors combinations can be used, as it is very improbable for an actual building to have such an architecture.…”

“…The highest percentage of the fires, 45% of the cases, have been caused intentionally, while more than 80% of the total fires have been occurred between 6 a.m. and 6 p.m. when people were around [53,54]. While setting up a good emergency plan is among the major and necessarily functions for educational institutions in order to offer protection and timely response to such a situation [55], improving other aspects related to the evacuation process-such as constantly evaluating the emergency plans, a proper set up of the desks and chairs with the classroom, providing larger corridors and larger evacuation doors or a proper placement of these evacuation doors-can be of great importance [56][57][58].…”