ACCESS TIME OF EMERGENCY VEHICLES UNDER THE CONDITION OF STREET BLOCKAGES AFTER A LARGE EARTHQUAKE

Abstract. The previous studies have been carried out on accessibility in daily life. However it is an important issue to improve the accessibility of emergency vehicles after a large earthquake. In this paper, we analyzed the accessibility of firefighters by using a microscopic simulation model immediately after a large earthquake. More specifically, we constructed the simulation model, which describes the property damage, such as collapsed buildings, street blockages, outbreaks of fires, and fire spreading, and the movement of firefighters from fire stations to the locations of fires in a large-scale earthquake. Using this model, we analyzed the influence of the street-blockage on the access time of firefighters. In case streets are blocked according to property damage simulation, the result showed the average access time is more than 10 minutes in the outskirts of the 23 wards of Tokyo, and there are some firefighters arrive over 20 minutes at most. Additionally, we focused on the alternative routes and proposed that volunteers collect information on street blockages to improve the accessibility of firefighters. Finally we demonstrated that access time of firefighters can be reduced to the same level as the case no streets were blocked if 0.3% of residents collected information in 10 minutes.