Evaluation of Underground Spaces Evacuation Effectiveness Procedia Engineering 165 ( 2016 ) 564 – 574 1877 7058 © 2016 Published by Elsevier Ltd This is an open access article under the CC BY NC ND li[.]
Available online at www.sciencedirect.com ScienceDirect Procedia Engineering 165 (2016) 564 – 574 15th International scientific conference “Underground Urbanisation as a Prerequisite for Sustainable Development” Evaluation of underground spaces evacuation effectiveness Anastasios Kallianiotis a,*, Dimitrios Kaliampakos a a School of Mining & Metallurgical Engineering, NTUA, Iroon Polytechniou Zografou, 15780, Athens, Greece Abstract As the need for the construction of underground spaces is growing, the need to integrate human behavior analysis into their design studies is obvious In order to make this happen, the current belief that subterranean structures are unsafe needs to be altered Increasing the safety of these spaces is the key factor that will achieve the most comfortable and effective utilization by the public The purpose of this paper is to evaluate underground spaces as regards to their evacuation effectiveness and to compare them with similar above-ground buildings To accomplish this, on one hand the factors that affect the evacuation effectiveness have been defined and on the other hand a tailor cut evaluation system has been developed Among the factors influencing the evacuation effectiveness, the location of the exit doors/routes is of primary importance Therefore, the evacuation evaluation methodology is based on the location of the exit doors design The developed software, apart from checking the compliance of a given underground space with the evacuation regulations regarding the exit door location, assesses and evaluates all possible combinations of exit doors location based on the evaluation system developed The grading for each combination results from the value of the variables that affect the evacuation procedures (i.e exit door distance), according to the evaluation function developed The evaluation system developed can give the evacuation safety profile of any space (under and above ground), helping a lot not only to check the safety of a given space, but also to design safer structures as well The results of the comparative study of various areas prove that underground structures are quite safe in reference to evacuation procedures even in case where only two exits are available © by Elsevier Ltd This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license 2016Published The Authors Published by Elsevier Ltd © 2016 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/) Peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the 15th International scientific conference “Underground Peer-review under scientific committee of the 15th International scientific conference “Underground Urbanisation as a Urbanisation as aresponsibility Prerequisite of fortheSustainable Development Prerequisite for Sustainable Development Keywords: Evacuation design, Evacuation evaluation, Evacuation safety, Underground spaces, Exit routes * Corresponding author Tel.: +302107722215 E-mail address: kallianiotis@metal.ntua.gr 1877-7058 © 2016 Published by Elsevier Ltd This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/) Peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the 15th International scientific conference “Underground Urbanisation as a Prerequisite for Sustainable Development doi:10.1016/j.proeng.2016.11.752 Anastasios Kallianiotis and Dimitrios Kaliampakos / Procedia Engineering 165 (2016) 564 – 574 Introduction Over the years the attention of manufacturers is increasingly turning to the occupants’ safety and the installation itself Increased safety offering comfortable working place and increases employee productivity and occupants’ attendance as well Moreover, the more effective is the security system and the emergency plan of an organization the less will be the financial losses and injuries of the occupants in the event of an emergency (e.g fire) Although the attention is focused on prevention, emergency situations cannot be avoided For this reason, the facilities will be able to offer an effective response plan for staff and visitors Underground spaces and facilities nature affect occupants’ behavior in normal or emergency conditions Although the environmental stressors related to underground work, such as poor lighting, temperature and humidity levels can now be controlled to a level which is almost identical to any other office environment, designers often have to take a balance between effectiveness and efficiency and sometimes the operating cost may be unacceptable (Roberts, et al., 2016) To improve the profile and usage of underground space, several studies approach this project from a different view, such as space connections, within underground and with above ground improvement to encourage the use of underground space (Zhao & Künzli, 2016) Main factors that obviously discriminate underground and over-ground areas and affect people attendance, tried to be assessed in order to support underground design, especially in high use structures such as transport stations (Durmisevic & Sariyildiz, 2001) In this paper an approach to evaluate the evacuation effectiveness of a structure† is presented The evaluation is determined based on two parameters that affect the evacuation effectiveness: evacuation time and overcrowding effect that are mainly influenced by three evacuation parameters that are included in standards and regulations: travel distance, travel in dead end and angle between exit doors (National Fire Protection Association, 2009) In order to compare the affect to evacuation procedure, evacuation parameters are converted to mathematical functions, which show the contribution of each parameter in the evacuation effectiveness Specialized study of emergencies and evacuation procedures in underground spaces is an essential tool, so that the actual and the appreciable safety the public perceives in such places is equalized with that of conventional overground buildings Safety Evaluation Last decades, organizations and companies have adopted a safety evaluation tool or rating system, either to improve their own products or services or to provide public with a safety degree of a widely use product that involves a variety of hazards A wide known safety rating system is the NCAP (New Car Assessment Program) that by using an assessment in four important areas (Adult protection - driver and passenger, Child protection, Pedestrian protection and Safety Assist technologies), determine the overall star rating of car safety In construction section there are other types of evaluation such as the roadside safety degree (RSD) for mountainous highway in China, in which by evaluate four categories factors (such as, geometry alignment, traffic volume, history crashes) determine the safety performance of the road (Li, et al., 2006) The proposed Safety Star Rating Scheme (SSRS) is an injury prevention initiative to lift the performance of workplace health and safety in New Zealand businesses Every business is being assessed against pre-developed standards in two stages: online self-assessment and on-site assessment by independent assessors (WorkSafe_New Zealand, 2016) An effective management safety system for structures or other “products” that involve hazards, is a crucial point in the development of a life extension and credibility A key component of such a system is a means of monitoring and determining the condition and safety services of an existing or under construction structure (Bergmeister & et al, 2003) † “Structure” definition will be used in this paper and includes any type of building, workplace, underground area etc 565 566 Anastasios Kallianiotis and Dimitrios Kaliampakos / Procedia Engineering 165 (2016) 564 – 574 Structure Evacuation Effectiveness (SEE) 3.1 Evaluation procedure The creation of the structure analysis begins with defining the factors that influence the effectiveness of a property or a situation In case of structure evacuation, there are two parameters thet define its effectiveness,: evacuation time and the duration of the overcrowding effect Several regulations and standards have included limits of independent variables that influence these parameters Those are, the maximum travel distance and maximum travel length in dead-end (National Fire Protection Association, 2009) as well as the relevant position of the escape exits, defined as the corner that each Point in space creates with two of the escape exits (Greek Fire Brigade Headquarters, 1999) Combining all of the above, a system that can evaluate the evacuation condition of a settlement can be created (Figure 1) Evacuation parameters optimization Evacuation effectiveness x Maximum x Minimum x Evacuation time x Overcrowding effect Evacuation parameters relation to evacuation effectiveness - Evaluation Fig Evaluation procedure for evacuation parameters By dividing the structure area into cells (Fig 2), it is possible to calculate the three independent variables of each one Therefore, the cell in purple dot adopts three values: angle φ, distance of shorter path (“Path1” and “Path2”) and travel distance in dead end (none in this cell) Those values are used to determine the evacuation effectiveness degree of the structure by using the right mathematical algorithm Fig Area divided into cells 567 Anastasios Kallianiotis and Dimitrios Kaliampakos / Procedia Engineering 165 (2016) 564 – 574 3.2 Mathematical function - Performance Each independent variables effect on evacuation effectiveness that has been determined is based on which parameter it affects (evacuation time or overcrowding effect) Therefore, a mathematical function of each variable has been determined (Kallianiotis, et al., 2014): Travel distance: ݂ͳ ሺ ݀ݔሻ ൌ ͲǤ݀ݔ (1) Travel distance in dead end area: ݂ʹ ሺ ݁ݔሻ ൌ ͻʹ݁ݔ (2) Angle: ݂͵ ሺ ܽݔሻ ൌ ͳǤͶ ܽݔെͲǤͷͺ (3) The variables xd, xe, xa, are the values of equivalent parameter and the natural numbers of each function for the worst case scenario, meaning high occupants’ density (in terms of person per area) (Kallianiotis & Kaliampakos, Under publication) Evacuation optimization purpose is to minimize the evacuation and overcrowding times In mathematical term this may be stated as: ሾ ሿ In order to optimize the results, a multi parameter function should be defined and optimized The type of this function is: ܨሺ ݀ݔǡ ݁ݔǡ ܽݔሻ ൌ ݇ͳ ݂ͳ ሺ ݀ݔሻ ݇ʹ ݄ሺ ܽݔሻ݇͵ ݂͵ ሺ ݁ݔሻ݂͵ ሺ ܽݔሻ ൌ ͳǤͶ ܽݔെͲǤͷͺ (4) where ki are the weight mean in order to standardize the range of each parameter function, because increasing evacuation time, overcrowding effect and dead end travelling distance, may lead to increasing the impact time to emergency effects (such as fire, smoke), panic occurrence and probability of being trapped, respectively In this paper, each of these three effects is assumed to have the same impact to evacuation effectiveness and in order to provide the same relative weight to each variable the following must be applied: ݇ͳ כሾ݃ሺ ݀ݔሻ݉ܽ ݔെ ݃ሺ ݀ݔሻ݉݅݊ሿ ൌ ݇ʹ כሾ݄ሺ ܽݔሻ݉ܽ ݔെ ݄ሺ ܽݔሻ݉݅݊ሿ (5) ݇ͳ כሾ݃ሺ ݀ݔሻ݉ܽ ݔെ ݃ሺ ݀ݔሻ݉݅݊ሿ ൌ ݇͵ כሾ݆ሺ ݁ݔሻ݉ܽ ݔെ ݆ሺ ݁ݔሻ݉݅݊ሿ (6) The factors were determined in a way that the value of the function gives the same result when the two variables take their highest value and the third the lowest or, respectively, the two variables take their lowest value and the third one its highest The parameters limits depend on the type of the settlement (NFPA) and that is why the coefficients k are not stable and therefore are given from the following tables ( Table and Table 2) As highest limits were taken those that are given in NFPA for distance (120m) and for movement in dead ends (35m) Due to the nature of the angle function, the angle of o and not 0o was selected as the minimum angle, because smaller angle essentially drives in a concurrence of the two escape exits and also the function leads to infinity Therefore, when it is isolated as maximum it gives a bit different results The results of Equation 4, also using the values from Table and Table 2, and for all cases are presented in Table The Function value is called “Cell Performance” Anastasios Kallianiotis and Dimitrios Kaliampakos / Procedia Engineering 165 (2016) 564 – 574 Table K2 Values range (Kallianiotis, 2015) Maximum travel distance limit (m) Minimum angle limit (degrees) 15 25 35 45 55 60 1.3 2.9 4.3 5.9 7.5 9.4 70 1.5 3.4 5.1 6.8 8.8 10.9 80 1.8 3.8 5.8 7.8 10.0 12.5 90 2.0 4.3 6.5 8.8 11.3 14.1 100 2.2 4.8 7.2 9.8 12.5 15.6 110 2.4 5.3 7.9 10.7 13.8 17.2 120 2.7 5.8 8.7 11.7 15.0 18.8 Table K3 Values range (Kallianiotis, 2015) Maximum dead-end limit (m) Maximum travel distance limit (m) 15 25 30 35 60 6.0 2.0 1.2 1.0 0.9 70 7.0 2.3 1.4 1.2 1.0 80 8.0 2.7 1.6 1.3 1.1 90 9.0 3.0 1.8 1.5 1.3 100 10.0 3.3 2.0 1.7 1.4 110 11.0 3.7 2.2 1.8 1.6 120 12.0 4.0 2.4 2.0 1.7 Table Function and max values Two maximum Two minimum parameters parameters 568 Distance Angle Dead-end Cell Performance 120 180 97.99 111.82 180 35 97.99 111.82 180 35 97.99 120 180 97.99 120 180 35 181.99 35 195.82 35 195.82 120 195.82 120 180 35 181.99 120 195.82 569 Anastasios Kallianiotis and Dimitrios Kaliampakos / Procedia Engineering 165 (2016) 564 – 574 The evaluation function takes its final form: ܨൌ Ͳǡ ݀ݔ ʹͶͺǡͶܽݔെͲǡͷͺ ʹǡͶ݁ݔ (7) The average values of all cells in area give the final “Performance” of the evacuation effectiveness Since in some areas there are cells that have lower or none probability to be occupied by a person, the Performance will arise from the weighted mean value: ࡼൌ σ ൌሺ࢝ ሻ σ ൌሺ࢝ ሻ ൌ ࢝ ڮ࢝ (8) ࢝ ڮ࢝ where wi is called weighting factor of component i pi and ranges from to1, and pi the rating of each cell In order to obtain a comparable value, the Performance is transformed to Average Performance that presents the performance in percentage mode, using the multi parameter function and the weighted mean previously mentioned (Equation 9) Pmax and Pmin are the maximum and minimum values that can get the Performance (i.e maximum angle -minimum distance - minimum dead-end travel and minimum angle - maximum distance – maximum deadend travel respectively) ࡼ ൌ ࡼെࡼ (9) ࡼࢇ࢞ െࡼ Average Performance (AP) value, is the comparable value to the optimum one, (which is 100%, that means all cells gives 0m travel and dead-end distance from any exit door and 180o with any two exit doors), as well as between other structures Underground Spaces SEE The aim of the current chapter is to evaluate several underground spaces as regards to their evacuation effectiveness and also to compare them to similar aboveground spaces (with the same type of occupancy) The effort to find the structure plans of the spaces under study was not very successful as the competent bodies for safety reasons were unwilling to give in public the emergency plans that clearly show all exits and escape routes So, the studied spaces that will be presented are from unofficial plans and for the papers credibility reasons their names will not be mentioned Furthermore, the evacuation parameters limits have been taken from NFPA regulation (for new structures), in order to determine the ki values for structure type ( Table 4) Table Evacuation Parameters limits by occupancy (National Fire Protection Association, 2009) Occupancy Type Dead-End Limit (m) Travel Distance Limit (m) Assembly 6.1 76 Educational 15 61 Health Care 9.1 61 Residential 15 or 9.1* 99 Mercantile 6.1 76 or 120* Business 15 91 Industrial 15 or 0* 75, 122, 23* Storage 0, 15, 30 122, 30, 60, 23* * It depends on sub-type (e.g high or low hazard) 570 Anastasios Kallianiotis and Dimitrios Kaliampakos / Procedia Engineering 165 (2016) 564 – 574 Table and Table present the evacuation effectiveness (AP value) for surface and underground structures respectively that are 100% complied with evacuation parameters Moreover, the average values of evacuation parameters are presented, as well as the number of available exits To make a comprehensive study, in Table other structures that comply with evacuation parameters are presented, but they provide low values of AP Combining Table and information from other studies (Kallianiotis, 2015), AP values (for 100% compliance) may range approximately from 50% to 95% and this range may be used as reference for any structure AP comparison Taking into account this information, a gradient class for SEE is proposed as shown in Table 8, to classify structure as regard its evacuation effectiveness Table Surface structures SEE analysis Name Type Exits Average Performance Average Distance (m) Average Angle (degrees) Average Dead-End (m) Museum Assembly 95.3% 6.1 151.3 0.0 Childhood Education Educational 11 95.7% 5.8 153.6 0.0 Retail Store Assembly 94.3% 7.1 135.9 0.0 Simple Office Business 80.3% 12.5 87.6 1.7 Industrial Building Industrial 92.7% 10.0 121.3 0.0 Table Underground structures SEE analysis Name Type Exits Average Performance Average Distance (m) Average Angle (degrees) Average Dead-End (m) Waste Repository Storage 87.5% 13.0 112.4 0.1 Church Assembly 92.3% 12.8 122.5 0.0 Gym Assembly 88.1% 13.7 82.2 0.0 Sport Center Assembly 94.8% 6.0 151.7 0.0 Parking Storage 95.2% 7.5 156.3 0.0 Table Random structures SEE analysis Name Type Exits Average Performance Average Distance (m) Average Angle (degrees) Average Dead-End (m) Structure Storage 68.2% 24.1 63.0 2.6 Structure Assembly 78.2% 14.3 88.0 1.5 Structure Industrial 85.4% 16.8 99.91 0.7 Structure Educational 70.3% 15.8 68.15 0.7 571 Anastasios Kallianiotis and Dimitrios Kaliampakos / Procedia Engineering 165 (2016) 564 – 574 Structure Business 58.8% 30.3 48.14 0.81 Table SEE classes Average Performance Value SEE class >95% A+ 90-95% A 80-90% B 70-80% C 60-70% D 50-60% E 4.1 AP effect to evacuation In this section the effects in evacuation effectiveness (time and overcrowding effect) are presented while reducing the Average Performance Table shows the AP values for three different combinations of exit locations and their percentage relation In addition, by using computer evacuation models (Pathfinder) the evacuation time and overcrowding effect have been calculated ( Table and Table 10) Overcrowding effect is the effect in which the occupants’ density is very high (over 2.5 pers/m2) and has been determined by three variables: start time – the time that the effect occurs firstly, area of effect – the area in which the effect takes place and duration – the total time the effect lasts Table Evacuation time with regard to AP value and occupants number ID Average Performance Relation to "High AP" Evacuation time (sec) as regards occupants number 200 500 750 1000 1200 1500 2000 High AP 93.4% - 40 54 73 95 114 141 185 Medium AP 89.6% 4% 41 58 77 98 118 147 188 Low AP 76.9% 21% 43 61 82 108 126 157 205 Medium AP Evacuation time increment 2.4% 6.9% 5.2% 3.1% 3.4% 4.1% 1.6% Low AP Evacuation time increment 7.0% 11.5% 11.0% 12.0% 9.5% 10.2% 9.8% 572 Anastasios Kallianiotis and Dimitrios Kaliampakos / Procedia Engineering 165 (2016) 564 – 574 Table 10 Evacuation time with regard to AP value and occupants number Overcrowding effect time (sec) as regards occupants number ID Start time (sec) Area (m2) Duration (sec) High AP 18 24 47 Medium AP 30 63 Low AP 40 83 Medium AP overcrowding effect increment 100.0% 20.0% 25.4% Low AP overcrowding effect increment 200.0% 40.0% 43.4% Results By studying on and determine the evacuation effectiveness of underground spaces, in contrast with surface buildings, the results provide that they offer high quality of evacuation procedures and are comparable to surface ones and sometimes provide greater SEE Moreover, even though in underground spaces is more difficult to create many positions of the escape routes (exit doors), the result is more than satisfying Meaning that the exits are placed correctly and also the design of the interior space (regarding walls, big obstacles etc.) was made in such a way that doesn’t leave areas in dead ends or far away from the closest exit The relation between the AP values has similar impact to evacuation effectiveness parameters (evacuation time and overcrowding effect) as shown in Table and where the 4% and 21% AP decrement leads to 2% and 10% evacuation time increment which is a part of total effectiveness reduction since the other part is the overcrowding effect increment that is measured on three variables (start time, area and duration) Finally, by knowing the Average Performance of a structure it is quite easy to determine in high precision the changes that may occur in the evacuation procedure (concerning evacuation time and overcrowding effect) when the AP value is increased or decreased by choosing a different combination of exit locations Conclusions - Discussion Many organizations try to improve the profile of their products by obtaining safety standards or safety rating systems that are provided by recognized organizations (ISO, NCAP) SEE is a very important property of a structure and depends on layout and interior design (regarding exits, walls, obstacles etc.) that may improve the structure (and company) profile Combining evacuation parameters and a mathematical function a reliable system has been created, to evaluate every structures’ evacuation effectiveness Beside the fact that the overcrowding effects may be numerical determine, the real effects in human behavior such as panic and psychological stress need more research and may adversely affect the evacuation procedure or even drive to a disaster Finally, obtaining the SEE class, an underground structure can inform employees and visitors that is well designed and has an integrated safety plan that is a key consideration of its operation and services By presenting this profile, a company may increase its productivity and usage Acknowledgments The authors would like to extend a special note of appreciation to Thunderhead Engineering group, for providing Anastasios Kallianiotis and Dimitrios Kaliampakos / Procedia Engineering 165 (2016) 564 – 574 573 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