An Experimental Study on Evacuation Times in a Subway Station Using Evacuation Parameters

Abstract

In this study, 292 participants took part in the evacuation experiment and completed a questionnaire. The study was conducted in a large subway station in order to analyze evacuation times during a fire, and used different evacuation parameters. The subway station where the experiment was conducted consisted of two basement floors. The evacuation started as soon as the train, in which a fire had occurred, came into the subway station and the doors were opened. The entire process of the evacuation experiment was recorded by using video cameras installed in the subway station. After the evacuation experiment was completed, participants were asked to answer questionnaires on evacuation parameters such as; gender, whether they had companions, how well they know that particular station, their usual level of awareness of evacuation, and their level of evacuation knowledge. By analysing the survey results, the time of egress from the train, and the total evacuation time, the results were as follows.
1) Female participants were slower by 23% on average compared to male participants. While male participants evacuated according to an order of egress from the train, female participants were affected by many other factors during evacuation.
2) Those who had companions were slower in evacuation by 29% on average compared to solo evacuees.
3) Knowledge of the area helped both female and male participants during the evacuation. The delay in evacuation according to a lack of knowledge of the station was only 9% in the case of male participants, but 21% in the case of female participants.
4) Those who did not usually think about evacuation were slower to evacuate by 8% on average than the other group who had a good level of awareness.
5) Those who did not have any knowledge of evacuation were slower by 18% on average than the group who had a high level of evacuation knowledge.