The effect of technical installations on evacuation performance in urban road tunnel fires

Abstract

Tunnels are separated from the ground by structural linings, and are enclosed and unfamiliar for occupants. In tunnel fires, occupants are faced with a dangerous environment and they need to evacuate. Conveying and obtaining information about the evacuation is the key issue for evacuees. Since tunnels typically have low lighting and little connection outside the tunnel, technical installations are the only approach to deliver information to occupants in order to guide their fast and safe evacuation. This is particularly an issue for urban road tunnels with large occupants' flow in a large underground space. The present study explores the effect and role of technical installations (alarms, information signs, and lighting) on people's evacuation performance in urban tunnel fires, through field experiments, questionnaires and interviews. Theory of affordance (sensory affordance, cognitive affordance and functional affordance) is taken into consideration and provides an integral evaluation for technical installations. Technical installations are useful in helping occupants notice the emergency, find exits and guide path, and information signs are regarded as the most powerful among those three. Besides, this experiment points out some side effect from alarms and ambiguity of signs which will result in serious consequence potentially. This study leads to guidance on improvement of technical installations on evacuation planning and procedures on urban road tunnels.

Creep of an FRP-strengthened metallic beam under cyclic temperature and cyclic load

“…The temperature range of concern in this paper are the ambient temperatures experienced during a normal service life [33], rather than (for example) the extreme temperatures related to fire [34,35]. As noted in the outline, the load cycles considered here are daily variations, not the higher frequency cycles due to traffic crossing.…”

Numerical study of the effect of gender composition and partitioning boards on evacuation in a two-line transfer transit rail subway station

“…The speed/acceleration of evacuees is jointly affected by the above three factors and is determined by equation (7). During the evacuation, the force effect of the latter two items of equation ( 7) is great, which makes it difficult for evacuees to achieve a high travel speed at bottlenecks.…”

“…Approximately 4.2% of passengers were obstructed when passing through gate-type gates; however, 17.9% of passengers were obstructed when passing through three-bar gates. Zhang et al 7 studied technical installations (alarms, information signs and lighting) on people's evacuation performance through field experiments, questionnaires and interviews and found that good visual conditions are the key to evacuation efficiency and can effectively reduce casualties.…”

Study on Risks and Countermeasures of Shallow Biogas during Construction of Metro Tunnels by Shield Boring Machine

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