A STUDY ON THE MEASURES TO ADDRESS TRAFFIC ISSUES IN THE EVENT OF AN EARTHQUAKE DISASTER

-LESSONS FROM THE HANSHIN AWAJI EARTHQUAKE-

Abstract

The large-scale traffic congestion which occurred directly after the Hanshin Awaji earthquake provides extremely important lessons with respect to earthquake disaster response measures. However, even now that over ten years have passed, it cannot be said that these lessons have been adequately applied to current disaster prevention plan. It could be said that one of the reasons for this is that exactly what sort of problems were caused has not been fully recounted, and that the true lessons have not been passed on to the present-day. Accordingly, in this research we survey all research and documentation regarding the transportation conditions in that time, and formulate an understanding of the state of a full cross-section of inflow into the disaster area directly after the disaster, and the types of traffic generated by the disaster. In doing so, we re-clarify the phenomena that occurred during the emergency response period of several tens of hours after the earthquake occurred. Further, based on this analysis, we recount the lessons that can be learned from the Great Hanshin earthquake with respect to traffic management measures during large, urban disasters and clarify the current counter-measure challenges.