A cellular automaton model for a pedestrian flow problem

Abstract

The evacuation phenomena in the two dimensional pedestrian flow model are simulated. The intended direction of the escape of pedestrians in panic situations is governed by the Eikonal equation of the pedestrian flow model. A new two-dimensional Cellular Automaton (CA) model is proposed for the simulation of the pedestrian flow. The solution of the Eikonal equation is used to define the probability matrix whose elements express the probability of a pedestrian moving in finite set of directions. The novelty of this paper lies in the construction of the density dependent probability matrix. The relevant evacuation scenarios are numerically solved. Predictions of the evacuation behavior of pedestrians, for various room geometries with multiple exits, are demonstrated. The mathematical model is numerically justified by comparison of CA approach with the Finite Volume Method for the space discretization and Discontinuous Galerkin Method for the implicit time discretization of pedestrian flow model.