Simulation

Methodology

A simulation model fusing space and

agent for indoor dynamic fire
evacuation analysis

Simulation: Transactions of the Society for

Modeling and Simulation International
2016, Vol. 92(3) 215232
The Author(s) 2016
DOI: 10.1177/0037549715626287
sim.sagepub.com

Lei Niu1 and Yiquan Song2

Abstract
Research on indoor fire emergency evacuations is crucial for hazard mitigation purposes, and dynamic indoor environments examined in this field demand a flexible solution. Current approaches separately address spatial and human elements of evacuations, producing superficial evacuation analysis results. In this paper, we employ a hierarchical structure
to efficiently organize indoor accessible space and combine it with agents to simulate the indoor evacuation process.
Thus, analysis functions from both accessible space and agent perspectives may be fused to thoroughly investigate simulation results. The experiment shows that this simulation model can be used to efficiently analyze evacuation characteristics of buildings for fire emergencies.

Keywords
indoor, fire evacuation simulation, space, agent, statistical analysis

1. Introduction
It is widely recognized that modern civilians spend much
of their lives inside of building structures. In turn, indoor
hazards strongly influence human security levels. In urban
tragedies (e.g. 9/11), more casualties result from secondary
disaster effects (e.g. debris) than from direct impacts. For
this reason, several efforts have been made to analyze the
influence of fire hazards on crowd evacuation measures.
Three main measures are employed to analyze fire evacuations: investigations of historical emergencies, evacuation drills and simulations.1-3 The first method may be
used to provide researchers with essential data (e.g. snapshots of critical hazard scenes) and thus to construct the
empirical foundations of corresponding studies. However,
the outputs of this approach should be tested via drills or
system simulations. Second, evacuation drills may reconstruct critical elements of real hazards. Rather, simulated
scenarios involving volunteers, controlled fire flames and
smoke may be used to reproduce a virtual fire hazard
scene. Third, fire evacuation software simulation
approaches normally involve the use of computers to run
programs that are designed to reproduce hazard effects
and evacuee behaviors.4-6
Thus, fire evacuation simulation methods are preferable
to other measures for three reasons. First, flexible test
scene reconfiguration can be more easily achieved within
software environments given the ease of floor plan

modification in cyber space. Second, simulations are less

expensive than real drills; economic and social costs of
drills are high in most cases, as drills can involve sealing
large buildings, such as public facilities, and gathering
volunteers to reproduce real hazard scenes. Third, even if
the security of enrolled personnel during drills is guaranteed, human fears may significantly hinder the objectivity
of relevant results. Rather, personnel will be more prudent
than usual after being notified of planned disaster events,
potentially resulting in a significant deviation from normal
human behaviors.
In addition to the aforementioned advantages, fire evacuation simulations can also flexibly and elegantly demonstrate detailed levels of hazard severity. For example, a
teaching facility and its occupants can be depicted by
agents in a virtual building, and the expansion of a fire
hazard composed of multiple spatial-temporal events can
be depicted by a set of deterministic or stochastic rules.

School of Surveying Engineering, Henan University of Urban

Construction, Pingdingshan, China
2
College of Urban and Environmental Science, Tianjin Normal University,
Tianjin, China
Corresponding author:
Lei Niu, School of Surveying Engineering, Henan University of Urban
Construction, Pingdingshan, 467036, China.
Email: niuneilneo@hotmail.com

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Thus, by combining building, agent and hazard events, a

rigorous evacuation model can rigidly reproduce dynamic
hazard spread patterns and their influence on evacuation
efficiency levels.
The remainder of this paper is organized as follows. In
Section 2, we present our survey of related literature. In
Section 3, the schema of the proposed solution is
described. In Section 4, several simulations are presented,
and corresponding results are examined from space and
agent perspectives. In Section 5, we describe the strengths
and weaknesses of the proposed model.

2. Literature review
Evacuation simulations have emerged as the focus of several research studies in recent years. Most research contributions in this field can be classified into three categories:
environmental configuration studies, evacuee behavior
analyses and hazard development descriptions.
The first category of studies investigates the spatial
configuration of buildings for evacuation purposes. It is
normally difficult to improve evacuation efficiency levels
using a faulty layout of indoor space. Thus, in-depth studies on this issue are of great value in the initial design process.5,7 Nevertheless, the optimization of an existing
layout is also feasible. Several works have addressed this
issue with the help of minor guidance route revisions.8
Furthermore, spontaneous routing guidance modifications
are also prevalent, as preselected emergency exits become
blocked by developing plumes.
Second, evacuee behaviors constitute the core facet of
simulations given the mitigation goals of evacuation
research. Different escape strategies can result in divergent
phenomena. For instance, evacuees who favor asocial
action will compete for safe places, resulting in crowd
congestion in narrow gates and potential trampling.9,10
Although it is difficult to properly represent evacuation
behaviors, accurate representations can normally be
achieved two ways. The first approach involves utilizing
specific sets of locomotion rules to mimic real personnel
actions (e.g. acceleration when no potential collision is
detected and deceleration under opposite conditions).3 The
second method involves depicting evolution principles of
personnel distributions inside of buildings.11 Namely, it
involves elaborating on the comprehensive consequences
of evacuation behaviors rather than on the underlying
mechanisms. For example, when two individuals compete
for an exit, the final result may be obtained by assigning
different occupying probability levels to each competitor
based on their physical features (e.g. height and speed).
Finally, the effects of hazards on facilities are now
drawing increased research attention.12 With the help of
related works, fire elements now play a key role in evacuation simulation processes. Dynamic fire development

can result in a chain reaction in the personnel distribution

of indoor accessible space, resulting in safe egress channel
updating, which has two effects. First, an evacuation path
should be synchronously updated to cover hazardous
areas; second, personnel path choices should also be
deeply affected by the presence of hazards. One innovative
approach to address this issue involves employing hazard
maps of indoor space.13-17 In turn, fire presence can be
efficiently visualized.
Existing evacuation simulation approaches separately
address the aforementioned elements. Thus, we are unable
to describe their interactions. In real life, humans make
evacuation decisions based on their spatial views of changing surrounding environments, and this process is propelled by building configuration hazard development.18,19
On an intuitive level, space, humans and hazards must be
studied together.20,21 The most effective way to implement
this approach involves defining subcategory and crosscategory rules for each element involved.22 Rather, we
adopt an evacuation simulation solution to fuse structure
configurations, human activities and detrimental events to
properly address evacuation analysis demands.
Our approach optimizes the organization of indoor
building space, which may minimize computing requirements. It can also be used to simulate the behaviors of evacuating agents by dynamically monitoring the surrounding
environments and by updating their egress plans in locomotion. Furthermore, fire development patterns are also properly reproduced using the model. In sum, this paper
describes the schema and workflow of fusing spatial subdivisions of indoor space and reveals dynamic fire effects and
their impacts on agent egress actions. Meaningful simulation results are presented for building evacuation efficiency
analysis and egress plan optimization.

3. Simulation system mechanism

3.1. Key indoor evacuation simulation issues
Five key issues must be discussed for us to describe our
simulation schema. The first issue pertains to the proper
use of spatial representations of indoor space; the second
pertains to temporal element integration; the third pertains
to the use of either individual behavior approaches or spatial distribution approaches to describe agent actions; the
fourth concerns ways of defining fire spread mechanisms;
and the last issue concerns simulation parameter tuning
and database design.
3.1.1. Spatial representation of indoor accessible space. Issues
of effective data organization are central to any indoor evacuation analysis. Researchers normally address such issues
via classical graphing approaches, which involve utilizing
connectivity graphs of indoor space to describe agent
movement patterns in a hazardous building. Moreover,

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Figure 2. Graphical representation with the accessible

rectangle subdivision of the same room shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1. Graphical and grid representation of indoor room

connectivity.

grid formulations of an environment, which involve the

use of a grid matrix to depict indoor navigation space, are
also employed.
The graphing method presents two advantages in relation to its grid-based counterpart. First, graphs are more
efficient. Although the grid formulation of a space can
allow a simulation algorithm to benefit from its matrix
structure, resulting exponential increases in computation
requirements may nullify this benefit. For example, floors
depicted by numerous grid cells cannot be as efficient as
those represented by several nodes (rectangles of floor
space) and edges (route-connecting rectangles) (Figure 1).
This deficiency is exacerbated when 3D heuristic routing
algorithms are introduced for agents. Under the worst conditions, 26 neighboring cells must be checked at each
search stage. Connectivity graphs also allow one to easily
update fire effects throughout agent navigation. Fewer
affected fire nodes must be marked as obstacles compared
to the large number of grids that must be marked as nonaccessible.
Our approach combines the graph representation
method with accessible rectangle subdivisions of geometric building space (Figure 2). This approach is
employed because in introducing accessible rectangles,
one can efficiently subdivide navigation space, and graph
usage can greatly simplify the representation of intrinsic
navigation connections between subdivisions. Here, accessible rectangles denote a polygon of rectilinear subdivisions for walkable regions in a building (e.g. the
rectangular part of a room floor space). This method presents two advantages. First, illustrations of spatial configurations are made compact and efficient through the
rectangle decomposition of accessible indoor space.
Furthermore, there is no need to evaluate whether one
small cell has been obstructed, and accessible attributes
only need to be considered for floor rectangles.

In addition, when complex connectivity information for a

building is available, it is easy to update hazardous influence regions due to the comparatively small number of
rectangles involved.
After accessible indoor space data for a building have
been collected, these data must be refined through building
examination. The following two methods are employed:
generate these data through the digitization of existing
blue prints or directly extract building models from existing digital files. The former approach is applied to historic
buildings and is not discussed in this paper. The latter
approach is applied to buildings with digital formats (e.g.
computer-aided design [CAD], City Geography Markup
Language Level-of-Detail 4 [CityGML LOD4] or Industry
Foundation Class [IFC] data formats). We use the
CityGML LOD4 format based on the CityGML standard,
which describes the indoor geometric attributes of buildings in digital city models, as it can generate indoor geometric information with moderate levels of data precision.
Although this standard cannot generate semantic attributes
as rigorous as those of IFC, which can be utilized to
describe relationships between relevant facility elements,
it still maintains a hierarchical structure of indoor building
objects. For example, a building can include a set of
rooms, and each room can be bounded by four inner walls.
These features are more crucial when generating a connectivity graph of indoor space than CAD files that do not
include any semantic information.
In using the CityGML LOD4 as the data source of our
indoor connectivity graph, we extract graph nodes from
relevant files. This can only be achieved via a manual
approach or semi-automatic approach. Manual solutions,
which are employed by operators who use their expert
knowledge and cognitive abilities to create accessible
nodes and connect them with edges, are prone to subjective conditions, such as human psychological states. Thus,
we adopt the other approach, which involves utilizing programs while employing expert knowledge to extract navigation data from building files. This approach involves an
error elimination process for removing geometric and
topological flaws from source data. This extra investment

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Figure 3. Workflow of accessible space extraction from the

CityGML LOD4.

can generate ample rewards when repetitive and tedious

tasks are required for accessible graph generation.
Core issues pertaining to semi-automatic solutions concern spatial subdivisions, which can be generated via the
triangle subdivision method or the rectilinear polygon
decomposition method. The former method cannot be used
to efficiently manage complex spatial relationships with
unique topological properties (e.g. concave geometric
objects, holes and islands). This limitation becomes more
pronounced in the presence of large vertex quantities.
Thus, we employ the rectangular decomposition approach,
which can be used to arrange accessible space more accurately and intuitively than can be done using the triangular
method, as relationships between rectangles are easily
deconstructed into rectilinear spatial subdivisions.
Although our approach cannot be used to efficiently organize irregular accessible indoor configurations, such as
curve edges, these irregular shapes can be bounded by rectilinear polygons and then properly managed. A complete
description of the proposed solution is presented in Niu
and Song.23 A general diagram on the extraction process
is provided in Figure 3.
3.1.2. Temporal element integration. The time element is
crucial to the simulation environment and agent

information updating. Ways of illustrating time differences

greatly affect simulation workflow design and output
results. The global clock update and agent time synchronization methods are currently used to address the temporal
element. The former method is a classical solution that is
used to update simulation systems.9,21 It is employed by
estimating the consequences of each time step. Here, a
time step refers to the minimum time difference required
to update a system state. This method may suffer from low
computation efficiency levels because under normal circumstances, numerous agents plan and complete their
actions transiently and still wait for the global clock to be
updated. In contrast to the global clock update method, the
agent time synchronization method has two prominent features: individual clock updating and self-collision resolution.24 In individual clock updating, each agent has its own
time recording function, and under self-collision resolution
conditions, agents must resolve collisions through
interactions.
We use a global clock update solution. Although this
solution may use several CPU cycles to synchronize agent
movements, it can greatly simplify the management of
potential collisions when agents gather at certain building
portals. For example, agents typically compete to pass
through a specific door. For this scenario, if using the individual clock update method, all corresponding agents must
stop what they are doing and resolve concurrent collisions.
Only one winning agent at a time can proceed through the
door and complete the collision processing step, whereas
all other agents must begin the next collision solving
cycle. This requirement can significantly increase computing requirements of the entire simulation, and collisionaffected agents may considerably delay their moving
actions due to the use of individual clocks, thus generating
abnormal results in relation to actual evacuation experimental results. Thus, this exceptional phenomenon will
significantly hinder the validity of the simulation results.
Via global clock updating, we can address collision
issues by determining the locomotion status of each agent
and by arbitrarily disputing position competition levels for
each time phase. This will not hinder the proceeding simulation process in relation to potential asynchronization
phenomena of individual clock updating if another method
is used.
3.1.3. Agent evacuation behavior simulation. As noted in the
literature review, agent evacuation behaviors can be
depicted as spatial distribution phenomena or as a combination of agent actions. Thus, agent evacuation behaviors
can be determined using two tools: a spatial distribution
rule for the entire swarm or an action flow for each agent.
The first approach involves updating all agent positions
with a prediction function that integrates the stochastic
function. In other words, each simulated evacuee position

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must be defined via a Markov process, and its probability

density function is described through a synthesis of the
examined characteristic (e.g. gender, age, height). The second approach involves assigning the necessary parameters
to the movement model of each agent (e.g. moving speed,
acceleration speed and collision detection scope). Thus,
while conducting simulations, an agent can plan and follow paths based on these settings and avoid collisions
automatically.
We employ the agent approach because we analyze
both macro and micro behaviors found in evacuation simulations, and detailed egress trails are needed to analyze
individual evacuation actions. Thus, the agent approach is
the only method that meets our criteria. To summarize,
with regard to agent evacuation behaviors, we use normal
moving behaviors, increasing speed behaviors, decreasing
speed behaviors and collision behavior estimations as our
evaluation parameters.
3.1.4. Fire hazard spreading. The fire spreading phenomenon is central to evacuation simulations. This process can
be divided into two phases: ignition and development.25 A
rigid fire simulation model is normally composed of flame,
smoke and plume simulations. However, we only use a
simplified spatial influence model for fire development
purposes because we do not intend to create a rigorous
combustion model. Thus, ignition levels are prescribed by
placing virtual fire sources at chosen positions in the simulated building, and fire development is formulated using a
spatial-temporal model that increases the area of the detrimental region linearly over time. This development
mechanism ignores the possibility of refractory materials
and decorative material combustion characteristics and
adopts spatial proximity as its sole evaluation criterion. In
other words, fires will only spread to spaces that surround
existing hazardous areas.
3.1.5. Critical parameter settings and database structure. In
our simulation schema, parameter settings are classified
into three categories: agent settings, hazard settings and
database initialization. Agent settings are parameters that
define initial position, speed and behavior collections.
Hazard settings determine fire hazard and spreading function quantities. Unlike the previous two settings, database
initialization does not involve simulation configuration. It
serves as a basic data framework for maintaining crucial
simulation information, such as extracted accessible spatial objects and simulation snapshots.
As noted above, agent positions must be defined prior
to simulation execution, and different settings may directly
affect simulation results. Although this paper does not
intend to discuss stochastic attributes of spatial distributions, we must discuss the random nature of agent distributions. All spatial distributions can be treated as long-term

Gaussian distribution processes, and this also holds for fire

evacuation simulations. To illustrate this feature, we utilize the extracted accessible rooms as the candidate set to
stochastically initialize agent positions. First, we assign a
standing room number to each agent using a random integer generator. Accurate standing positions are then defined
by randomly selecting positions within the scope of the
selected room footprint. Stochastic features are also found
in agent moving characteristics, and this issue will be covered in an upcoming study. Thus, we assign the unique
agent speed peak value of 1.47 m/s proposed in the SFPE
book.26 In addition, a reasonable acceleration speed parameter is introduced to objectively depict increasing and
decreasing agent motivation abilities. This figure, which
amounts to 0.1 m/s2, is drawn from related kinematic
research.27
The physical database schema is presented in Figure 4.
These tables are classified into two categories: accessible
information tables and simulation result tables. While the
former maintain extracted passable information of the
examined building, the latter store and analyze corresponding simulation results. Detailed information on all of the
tables is listed below.
The accessible_coordinate_of_building table shows
the unique id (GUID), coordinate scope and sequence
number of each building. The intersection_part_of_building table is the same connection space attribute that stores
related information between linking accessible space
objects, which include the rooms and corresponding rectangles. The accessible_coordinate_of_room and accessible_coordinate_of_rectangle tables play the same role
as the accessible_coordinate_of_building table at the
room and rectangle levels, respectively. The intersection_part_of_room table similarly stores geometric coordinates and connecting relationships between rectangles at
the room level.
The simulation_information table includes detailed
simulation data, such as simulation IDs, agent numbers,
fire source numbers, start times and elapsed times. The
agent_record table stores agent IDs and start positions
for each agent of a specific simulation. The agent_path_result table stores geometric coordinates for each agent
time stage. The agent_statistic_for_simulation_result
table stores statistical analysis data on agent speeds, traveling times, moving distances and accessible passage region
numbers. The accessible_rectangle_result table stores
agent evacuation action data managed from the accessible
region aspect. The data stored in this table are unique, as
no other solution stores this type of data. The
AR_statistic_result table stores processed statistical
results using an accessible rectangular view. From data
presented in this table, we can determine the agent spatialtemporal distribution feature of a specific region for a certain simulation.

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Figure 4. Simulation database schema.

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Figure 5. Indoor evacuation simulation workflow.

3.2. Simulation process

3.2.1. Simulation workflow and critical event. The workflow
of our simulation is summarized in Figure 5. In addition to
the initialization and finalization stages, simulations
involve three sub-workflows: monitor, agent and hazard
spreading workflows.
The first workflow shows how the monitoring object
initiates the entire simulation system, synchronizes agent
movements and gathers simulation data (Figure 6). It sets
the global system clock to zero and sets the simulationstart signal variable value to initiate the simulation

process. It then scans the time step finishing status table

for a given time interval to determine whether all of the
agents will complete their path planning and movement
tasks. The monitor also resolves collisions between agents
that result in a dead end (e.g. two agents move into one
position at exactly the same time). The monitor terminates
simulations based on two principles. The first denotes that
all agents already move to exits, and the second states that
a preset time threshold has been achieved to prevent infinite system looping as a result of extremely unique conditions (e.g. agents are set to avoid hazard regions, but

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Figure 6. Monitor execution workflow.

hazard regions already cover the entire building). The final

monitoring task involves store simulation recording data
and generating statistical data. The recording data contain
moving information for all agents for each time step (position, speed and acceleration speed, to name only a few).
These data are used during the subsequent statistic generalization process and for the graphic replay of simulation
results.
The second main workflow in our simulation is the
agent workflow (Figure 7). Unlike the monitor, which has
a supervising function, the agent only focuses on routing
and path following tasks. At the start of this workflow,
agents initialize their positions by generating random numbers according to standing room and rectangle indexes.

They then locate the standing point by fetching the geometric coordinate scope of the selected standing rectangle
and use scope data as the base set to randomly select accurate location coordinates. Hereafter, agents utilize the
standing point as the starting position of the routing algorithm, which is derived from the A* algorithm. The A*
algorithm is used rather than the other egress path planning algorithms because the agent distribution in the studied facilities is not high, and thus swarm phenomena are
not likely to occur. Moreover, because the psychological
agent condition is set to rational and because fire hazard
factors are not critical, panic conditions will not occur.28
However, the selected A* algorithm differs from the static
weight setting of classical A* solutions. Our algorithm

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Figure 7. Agent execution workflow.

updates the routing weight of relevant searching areas during the execution process based on hazard development
patterns.
Using the generated evacuation path, agents move
toward an exit. With hazards synchronously developing,
each agent also pays attention to the status of the surrounding agents. Rather, agents decelerate when possible
collisions are detected. The speed figure will decrease to
zero when reduced speeds cannot prevent potential collisions and will increase to the normal working levels after
collision-solving processing is complete. We believe that
this speed tuning mechanism could vividly reproduce
steering behaviors of human movement that occur during
evacuation processes.12,29 While speed adjustment

functions are integrated with agents, position-updating

functions are completed by the monitor object to prevent
the occurrence of spatial occupation modification conflicts
between agents.
The last workflow describes the hazard development
processes. In our model, hazards consistently develop over
an entire simulation period. Therefore, hazards are given a
separate development workflow (Figure 8). Concurrently,
hazards expand their area of influence via a deterministic
model, and the spatial coverage change rate of a hazardous
area is set before each simulation is run. Therefore, hazard
objects must follow this rule to extend their occupying
space. Nevertheless, hazardous region marking tasks are
assigned to the monitoring object to prevent the occurrence

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Figure 8. Hazard development workflow.

movement, which are listed in corresponding columns

shown in the agent_statistic_result table: the mean_speed field represents the average speed of a specific
agent, and the MSE_speed field (speed mean square
error) shows the average deviation trend for all of the
speed samples; the escape_time field records the egress
elapse time; the move_distance field shows the total travelling distance; and the pass_room_number and
pass_AR_number fields show passing room numbers and
passing accessible rectangle numbers, respectively.
As our simulation solution can generate regional statistics, an AR_statistic_result table (accessible rectangle
statistical results) stores such data. These data are generated by accumulating data for agents that have passed a
specific region. Due to the configuration of accessible
indoor space for the study of rectangular buildings, agent
actions are attached to each accessible rectangle. The
max_existing_agent_number attribute denotes the peak
value of active agents in each rectangle. The accumulative_agent_number attribute measures the historical passing
agent number for a specific rectangle. The mean_agent_number attribute denotes the average number of agents
in a rectangle, and the MSE_agent_number (mean square
error of the agent number) attribute depicts the average
deviation between the mean agent number and all sample
agent numbers. The mean_agent_speed attribute measures the average speed of agents that move in a rectangle,
and the MSE_agent_speed (mean square error of agent
speed) attribute indicates differences between the average
and sample agent speeds. The mean_agent_move_distance attribute stores the total travel distance value for a
given rectangle, and the MSE_agent_move_distance
(mean square error of the moving distance) attribute measures the error value between the average distance and
each sample distance. The mean_agent_move_time field
measures the average elapse time of agents that cross a rectangle, and the MSE_agent_move_time (mean square
error of the moving time) attribute denotes the difference
between average times and agent moving times for this
rectangle.

of read/write violations between hazard region objects and

agents.

4. Indoor emergency evacuation and

simulation data analysis
3.2.2. Statistic generation. Our systems statistic generation
4.1.
Simulation settings
mode differs from those of classical solutions, as we classify simulation outputs into two categories: agent statistical data and rectangle statistical data. The former data are
generated by processing time step snapshots of agents. As
noted above, moving speed, direction and timestamp data
for every agent are stored in the agent_path column of
the agent_path_result table. Moreover, because agent
tails are fused into one stream in this column, we must
extract and parse it prior to analysis. The current statistical
analysis approach covers six characteristics of agent

The simulation experiment was conducted on the OTB

research building of the Delft University of Technology.
This building is composed of four layers and has four
emergency exits that were utilized in our simulation
(Figure 9). Two exits are located on both ends of the longest corridor on the first floor, and two other exits are
located in the southwest and southeast corners of the
entrance hall. The exits are 1 m wide, and the hazard
source was set to the middle of the second floor of the

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225

Figure 9. Floor plan and hazard settings of the simulated

building.

northernmost building. The hazard development pattern

was set to follow a constant spreading speed of 1 m/s.
According to a pilot study, this building is normally occupied by less than 500 individuals; thus, we use this number
as an agent number to determine the buildings evacuation
efficiency level. All simulated agents were distributed randomly as described in the agent workflow section. We ran
64 simulations, with only half considering fire hazard
effects on evacuation behaviors. The simulation platform
was implemented using Visual C + + and OpenGL on a
personal computer with Core i5 750 CPU and 12 GB
RAM specifications.
The fire evacuation simulation data analysis phase was
divided in two phases: the first phase focused on the agent
aspect (the path chosen from each agent perspective), and
the second phase focused on the accessible space aspect
(data organization from the building region perspective).
From the agent aspect, we examined three types of data:
elapsed time, travel distance and speed. From the accessible rectangle aspect, we examined four types of data: the
accumulative passing agent number, the maximum number of existing agents, the maximum density of standing
agents, and the average traveling time and the average traveling speed of passing agents.

4.2. Simulation results

It was difficult to organize the simulation data based on
dual aspects, as 64 simulations were conducted in total,
and each simulation included all movement snapshots for
500 agents. Thus, we arranged the simulation data illustration in the following order. First, an overall data view that
covers the simulation computational performance and
compares simulations based on hazard influences and
simulations while disregarding hazards was generated.

Figure 10. Demonstration of time costs for each simulation.

Second, all egress efficiency levels of accessible rectangles involved were determined. Finally, the evacuation
trail of the agent with the longest egress time for a specific
simulation was replayed.
As shown in Figure 10, the time period spent for each
simulation is acceptable and oscillates at approximately
575 s, with the worst simulation approaching 750 s. Thus,
we can generate each set of evacuation results in no more
than ten minutes, which is affordable for fire evacuation
efficiency analyses. The statistics shown in Figure 11 present the most crucial characteristics of simulation evacuation agents, which are illustrated in the scatter box chart
presenting both the mean and standard deviations for relevant subjects. For the accessible pass rectangle number
shown in Figure 11(a), all simulations have an average
number of 50. As in Figure 11(b), the pass room numbers
of the two compared conditions are noticeably different:
When considering hazards, the average number is more
than eight, but when not considering hazards, this number
is less than seven. In Figure 11(c), the average agent speed
for both conditions is approximately 1.46 m/s, which is
slightly lower than the maximum agent speed of 1.47 m/s
adopted in our simulation. The difference between hazard
consideration and omission is also significant for the mean
agent moving distance and escape time (Figure 11(d) and
(e), respectively). Rather, whereas the mean agent moving
distance approaches 70 m when hazards are considered,
the corresponding figure oscillates at approximately 62 m;
furthermore, whereas the mean agent escape time with
hazard consideration approaches 50 s, its counterpart
approaches approximately 45 s.
Figures 12 and 13 are plots that show two different
views that demonstrate the simulation data used in our
study. Through our use of accessible rectangle objects in
our simulation, each accessible region in our simulation

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Figure 11. Key characteristics of agents during evacuations.

generates its own data report. Therefore, Figure 13 shows

more intuitive information on the distribution of evacuation efficiency data that could not be generated by simply
plotting mean and standard deviation values shown in
Figure 12. For example, whereas Figure 12(a) only shows
that the mean maximum agent number is approximately
four, Figure 13(a) shows that while most accessible rectangle values range between zero and five, a large number
have a value that significantly exceeds 10. In addition,
Figure 13(b) shows that the mean accumulation value for
accessible rectangles is distributed along several numeric
layers.
The statistical data rendered in spatial form are shown
in Figure 14. This figure is composed of 10 parts that present the mean maximum agent number, the mean accumulation agent number, the mean value of the average agent
speed, the mean value of the average agent moving distance and the mean value of the average agent moving
time for all agent-crossed accessible rectangles in all of
the simulations. The following rendering color settings are

used: light green for the first class, dark green for the second class, light red for the third class and dark red for the
fourth class. Detailed class thresholds for each data analysis are listed in Table 1. In addition to simulation data
organized based on the spatial aspect, a replay of the individual agent path is also available. As in Figure 15, agent
snapshots with the longest evacuation times of the simulations are presented.

4.3. Analysis of the results

Figure 11 shows that agents with awareness of detrimental
elements exhibit a higher upper bounding level of travel
distance and require a longer evacuation time, potentially
due to winding strategies employed to avoid adverse features, such as plumes or flames. Furthermore, the average
travelling speed of the simulated agents is the same, and
the distribution of standard deviations for the mean speed
is not significantly distinguished and leads to no other
meaningful interpretation.

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Figure 12. Statistics on the main characteristics of accessible rectangles organized by simulations.

Table 1. Data analysis classification and thresholds of different classes.

Analysis characteristic

Mean maximum agent number

Mean accumulation agent number
Mean of mean agent speed
Mean of mean agent move distance
Mean of mean agent moving time

Threshold
First class
(light green)

Second class
(dark green)

Third class
(light red)

Forth class
(dark red)

0
0
1.4 m/s
0m
0s

5
50
1.2 m/s
5m
5s

10
100
0.5 m/s
10 m
10 s

20
150
0 m/s
15 m
15 s

The analysis of the simulation from the spatial aspect

focuses on an examination of Figures 12 and 13. At first,
Figure 12 does not appear to provide any meaningful
information on the simulations. Rather, the mean maximum agent number, the accumulated agent number, the
mean agent number, the mean agent speed, the mean
agent moving distance and the mean agent travel time

values appear to be virtually equal. However, upon closer

examination, we find that when hazard effects are considered, agent movements cover large spaces, and this observation is supported by a large upper boundary of the
mean average agent travelling distance and time than the
non-hazard-focused counterparts shown in Figure 12(e)
and (f).

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Simulation: Transactions of the Society for Modeling and Simulation International 92(3)

Figure 13. Main characteristics statistics of accessible rectangles organized by accessible rectangles.

Although the data distribution shown in Figure 13

appears trivial at first glance, it does reveal crucial information. The black boxes denoting hazard-focused scenes
occupy higher positions in Figure 13(e) and (f) than their
non-hazard-focused counterparts. This phenomenon is proven by the previously described higher upper boundary
numbers shown in Figure 12(e) and (f). Spatial form evacuation simulation data distributions shown in Figure
12(a), (b), (c) and (d) are quite striking. As in Figure 12(a)
and (c), numerous accessible rectangle data present nonzero values around the mean number line; whereas in
Figure 12(b) and (d), they scatter along different lines and
form several layers. This may denote that the mean and
maximum number of passing agents converge to a single
value, whereas the accumulation agent number and mean
speed do not converge. Regarding the last two sections of
Figure 12, the distributions of both conditions oscillate
without an axiom, and this may be attributed to the fact
that accessible rectangles occupy small spaces, generating
a myopic view of agent activities. Moreover, evacuation

progress occurs over a long spatial-temporal event with

Gaussian distribution features, which may lead to an insignificant statistical distribution of simulation results.
The illustration shown in Figure 14 serves as a spatial
view of the simulation results. The background spreading
hazard significantly affects the maximum agent number
when comparing scenes: the developing hazard scope on
the second floor drives personnel to exit through the far
corners. Thus, southwest exits have larger agent numbers,
as shown in Figure 14(a) and (b). However, this phenomenon dose not continue for the mean accumulated agent
number due to the long associated time elapse period. We
can only assume that the accumulated agent number in the
west stairs on the ground floor increase when considering
hazard effects. The same situation applies for the mean
agent moving speed. No significant value changes between
the two compared scenes can be observed, and only minor
differences exist. This may be attributable to the fact that
changing agent egress routes do not necessarily lead to
speed variations along different paths.

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Figure 14. Statistical rendering in spatial form.

Notable spatial divergences are easily identifiable at a

mean agent moving distance of 14 g/h. Large moving distances in accessible rectangles around the southwest corners can be observed. This result may be attributable to the
avoidance of hazard spread, causing agents to travel further from the hazard source. Because the travelling speeds
of the two scenes are not noticeably different, the mean
travelling time distribution follows the average moving
length of each space subdivision, which can be easily predicted using the time = distance/speed equation.
When analyzing a specific simulation case to investigate sequential actions and routes of the last-man-out
shown in Figure 15, bottlenecks of the spatial configuration of the research building can be identified. The selected
agent initiates the egress process in the neighborhood of
the hazard source. Thereafter, due to hazard effects, it must
wind around to the east stairs. In following egress actions,
the agent reaches the ground floor and moves to the southwest exit, escaping the building with a time cost of 140 s
and thus meeting the critical clearance time threshold for
the building. We can still minimize egress times and
increase holistic evacuation efficiency levels by building
exits at the northeast corner.

5. Discussion
To summarize, from the agent aspect, the introduction of
hazard effects on evacuees repels agents from moving
toward stairs positioned further away from hazardous
regions. This phenomenon complies with the results of
existing research,30-32 and it can easily be attributed to
human tendencies to avoid damage and pursue safety.
Although this human tendency is common sense, actual
effects of hazards are still debated. In our experiments,
passing room numbers, travel distances and agent hazard
consideration times increase in the presence of a fire threat.
Although this finding confirms results generated from
these methods,33,34 it is difficult to show that room level
effects on real hazards are the same under actual circumstances. Some existing studies appear to conclude that
boundary effects of hazard regions play a more prominent
role than subdivided regions.35 Nevertheless, the use of
room-level spatial objects may still vividly reproduce
regional effects of indoor hazards, for evacuees can only
observe hazards after entering hazardous regions.
In addition to expectations of hazard impacts on evacuees, key quantitative egress figure effects are also worth
noting. According to our experiment, adverse phenomena

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Simulation: Transactions of the Society for Modeling and Simulation International 92(3)

Figure 15. Snapshot of the simulation for the agent with the longest egress time.

do not dramatically affect the speed-related statistical data,

and agents do not increase their speeds to noticeably
higher levels when made aware of detrimental elements.
This finding contradicts the results of some existing studies33,36 and may be attributed to different experimental
conditions. Other comparable studies position dense
groups of evacuees throughout examined buildings and
thus do not employ the moderate density settings used in
our experiment. These different results may not be treated
as a paradox. Rather, a similar phenomenon should still be
expected if our density settings are changed.
From the spatial aspect, when agents evaluate hazard
effects, exits and regions in the southeast corner, which are
far from the hazard source, receive higher volumes than
they do under the opposite conditions. Although this phenomenon is confirmed by other studies that use the same
outputs, the opposite situation is also found in other studies.34,37 We attribute this inconsistency to varying evacuee
stress levels. Rather, individuals can become stressed and
act unreasonably and follow unsafe egress paths when
placed in dire circumstances.
Moreover, passing agent speed differences are not
clearly observed between the two situations from the

spatial aspect. This finding also represents an acceptable

moderate density output for evacuees. Because individuals
are not closely surrounded by others, they can adapt their
speed levels based on egress requirements. This finding is
supported by studies of evacuees under slow density conditions.3,32,38 Moreover, the increase in agent travelling
distances and times is also supported by statistical data for
the regions studied in our experiment. This increase is easily determined by measuring travelling times and dividing
speed levels by distance levels, and with escape speeds
under moderate population density levels, travel periods
linearly increase with an increase in distance.

6. Conclusion
This paper presents functions for extracting and representing indoor accessible space in a hierarchical manner. The
indoor evacuation simulation approach can involve
employing this structure to efficiently organize and update
egress navigation information. Thereafter, a complete
simulation model is generated through the integration of
agent technologies. This model employs the 3D rendering

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function to efficiently determine on-the-fly evacuation statuses and can be used to replay recordings of historical
snapshots for each simulation. Regarding the simulation
data analysis, our solution can be used to illustrate crucial
egress characteristic statistics in classical figure and 3D
spatial rendering forms.
To summarize, we present a complete dual aspect simulation model for determining and analyzing indoor fire
evacuation efficiency levels for buildings. This approach
innovatively involves the use of agent and accessible space
perspectives. The meso-level 3D spatial statistic rendering
function of the gathered evacuation simulation data is also
innovative.
Future studies that can complement our model may
employ three methods:
(1)
(2)

(3)

the use of fine grids to improve spatial calculation

speeds of hazard effect spreading;
the adoption of the parallel technologies (e.g.
OpenMP or CUDA) to accelerate simulation
calculations;
the fusion of visibility analyses to vividly reproduce blockage impacts of plumes generated by
fire combustion.

Acknowledgement
The authors gratefully acknowledge the contribution of Liu Liu
of the Delft University of Technology, who provided the experimental data.

Funding
This research was funded by the National Natural Science
Foundation of China (grant numbers 41501440, 41571387,
41201375, and 41471341), the Henan Province Science and
Technology Program (grant number 152102310321), the Key
Research Program of Higher Education of Henan Province (grant
number 15A170002), the Tianjin Research Program of
Application Foundation and Advanced Technology (grant number 14JCQNJC07900), and the Tianjin Science and Technology
Planning Project (grant number 14TXGCCX00015).

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Author biographies
Lei Niu received his BS from Henan University, China,
in 2004, and PhD from Wuhan University, China, in
2010. He is currently an associate professor of geographic
information systems in the School of Surveying
Engineering, Henan University of Urban Construction,
China. His research interests are in indoor evacuation
simulation, 3D GIS and emergency responding.
Yiquan Song received the PhD degree in geographic
information systems from the Institute of Remote Sensing
Applications, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS),
China, in 2011. Currently he is an associate professor in
the School of City and Environmental Science of Tianjin
Normal University, Tianjin, China. His research interests
are Virtual Geographic Environments (VGEs) and geographical process simulation and analysis.

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