Lane-based multi-class vehicle collaborative evacuation management

Abstract

Mixed traffic evacuation management is recognized as a critical and challenging task. This paper develops a bi-level model to address the multi-class vehicle collaborative evacuation problem. The upper-level program is a mixed-integer nonlinear programming (MINLP) model to determine the optimal lane allocation scheme according to the fleet size. The lower-level program is formulated as multiple independent system optimal dynamic traffic assignment (SO-DTA) problems to load mixed traffic flow. A two-layer solution method integrating branch-and-bound algorithm is developed to solve the model. Finally, the optimization model is applied in a small network and a real-world network. Results demonstrate that (1) the evacuation performance of multi-class vehicle collaboration is better than that of single-class vehicles under the medium demand levels; (2) the proposed model realizes the coupling among evacuation demand, fleet size, and road network capacity; (3) the shortest path should first be allocated to the bus during a mass evacuation.