Emergency Management of Urban Rail Transportation Based on Parallel Systems

Integrating artificial systems, computational experiments, and parallel execution (ACP) is an effective approach to modeling, simulating, and intervening real complex systems. Emergency response is an important issue in the operation of urban rail transport systems for ensuring the safety of people and property. Inspired by the ACP method, this paper introduces a basic framework of parallel control and management (PCM) for emergency response of urban rail transportation systems. The proposed framework is elaborated from three interdependent aspects: Points, Lines, and Networks. Points represent the modeling of urban rail stations, Lines describe the microscopic characteristics of urban rail connections between designated stations, and Networks present the macroscopic properties of all the urban rail connections. Based on the given framework, a series of parallel experiments, which were impossible to achieve in real systems, can now be conducted in the constructed artificial system. Furthermore, the constructed artificial system can be used to test and develop effective emergency control and management strategies for real rail transport systems. Therefore, this proposed framework will be able to enhance the reliability, security, robustness, and maneuverability of urban rail transport systems in case of an emergency.