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BIM-ABM simulation for emergency evacuation from conference hall, considering gender segregation and architectural design

ABSTRACT Human behavior simulation in emergency evacuation helps engineers identify design shortcomings and improve building performance. Conference halls, as a public assembly, are at a greater risk than ordinary buildings due to the number of participants, space density, and gender segregation. In this study, a BIM software (Revit) with the human behavior simulation engine (AnyLogic code) upon the agent-based modeling (ABM) approach was applied to simulate emergency evacuation from NIGC conference hall with 177 delegates. In order to consider gender segregation and architectural design on egress flow, three groups of people with special characteristics and behavioral rules were considered in five different egress scenario including different positions and dimensions of exit doors. Each simulated scenario was repeated 100 times to minimize error. Then, the model was verified through a real experimental test with the cooperation of 22 volunteers. Although the average evacuation time for all scenarios did not differ beyond 13%, the results showed that placing two symmetrical exit doors on both sides of the conference hall offers the most efficient and fastest egress pattern. Also, the critical evacuation time was 0.4–0.6 min., while 80% of people left the conference hall within 1.2–1.4 min. after alarm (excluding scenario 4). The results also indicated the impact of the location of sitting of low-speed people on the evacuation time and egress pattern. All these results help architectures and building interior designers to properly design and locate exit doors, corridors, number and distance between seats and rows in a conference hall.