Training of Crisis Mappers and Map Production from Multi-sensor Data: Vernazza Case Study (Cinque Terre National Park, Italy)

This aim of paper is to presents the development of a multidisciplinary project carried out by the cooperation between Politecnico di Torino and ITHACA (Information Technology for Humanitarian Assistance, Cooperation and Action). The goal of the project was the training in geospatial data acquiring and processing for students attending Architecture and Engineering Courses, in order to start up a team of "volunteer mappers". Indeed, the project is aimed to document the environmental and built heritage subject to disaster; the purpose is to improve the capabilities of the actors involved in the activities connected in geospatial data collection, integration and sharing. The proposed area for testing the training activities is the Cinque Terre National Park, registered in the World Heritage List since 1997. The area was affected by flood on the 25th of October 2011. According to other international experiences, the group is expected to be active after emergencies in order to upgrade maps, using data acquired by typical geomatic methods and techniques such as terrestrial and aerial Lidar, close-range and aerial photogrammetry, topographic and GNSS instruments etc.; or by non conventional systems and instruments such us UAV, mobile mapping etc. The ultimate goal is to implement a WebGIS platform to share all the data collected with local authorities and the Civil Protectio

Integrating BIM with ArcGIS for Indoor Navigation

With increasing demand for indoor navigation and rapid developments in Building Information Modeling (BIM), indoor routing and analysis attracts attention from both the GIS and architecture worlds. This project’s goal was to integrate BIM with GIS and utilize it for indoor navigation use. It aimed to provide executable methods in ArcGIS for indoor path generation and to explore the possibilities for further applications. In this project, Data Interoperability Extension was used to operating the transformation from Industry Foundation Classes (IFC) to geodatabase. After importing the data, two methods were proposed: Mesh and TIN. The Mesh method used a standard-sized grid graph as the referencing network for a floor and subsequently mapping the movement on a 2D plane to the movement along grid edges. TIN method utilized the TIN network as the base; it maps the movement on a 2D plane to the movement along TIN edges. Both of the methods were achieved by using tools and functions in ArcGIS. In conclusion, the result shows that the Mesh approach provided a very precise network for the building floor, whereas the TIN approach was efficient on the generating process side

On the way of integrating evacuation approaches

With the growing pressure on available urban space and the construction of more and more complex building infrastructures, the navigational task for building users is getting increasingly difficult. As people react more impulsive under stressful situations, emergencies can exacerbate way finding problems. Additionally, leadership and familiarity with the (topological structure of a) building can influence the ease of finding appropriate evacuation routes. In research, two separate and distinctive techniques for modelling evacuation paths have been developed: evacuation simulation modelling through complex computer simulations and 3D network modelling based on graph theory. Taking into account a global user perspective, the 3D network modelling approach has the advantage to preserve a close connection with the semantic building structure. Following this approach, existing three dimensional evacuation routing algorithms tend to use Dijkstra's shortest path algorithm. However, as more factors, compared to path length, influence evacuation situations, literature acknowledges a void in representing more realistic, complete and accurate emergency situations. This paper presents a first step in creating such integral algorithm by implementing capacity constraints based on user flow control on a 3D geometric network model. In the future additional topics such as zonal partitioning can be added to the algorithm, moving to an integration of both evacuation approaches

스캔 도면을 활용한 이동약자용 실내 그래프 데이터베이스 구축

학위논문(박사) -- 서울대학교대학원 : 공과대학 건설환경공학부, 2021.8. 박슬아.사람들의 실내 활동이 다양해지면서 건물의 규모가 커지고 구조가 복잡해지고 있다. 이러한 실내 환경의 변화는 교통약자의 이동성 보장에 대한 사회적 관심을 증가시켰으며, 교통약자 맞춤형 실내 라우팅 서비스에 대한 수요 또한 증가시켰다. 특히 많은 이동 제약을 가지는 이동약자 대상 서비스의 경우에는, 최적 경로를 계획하는 과정에서 개인의 선호나 경험이 반영된 개인화된 서비스로 범위가 확장되고 있다. 이러한 배경에서, 스키마가 유연하고 데이터의 가공 및 처리가 효율적인 데이터베이스의 구축이 필요하다. 본 연구에서는 스캔한 도면 이미지를 활용한 이동약자용 실내 그래프데이터베이스 구축 기법을 제안하였다. 먼저, 국내외 실내 공간 관련 표준 및 설계 기준들의 검토를 통해 이동약자의 통행과 관련된 실내 공간 및 객체, 영향 요인들을 도출하여 개념적 데이터 모델을 설계하였다. 또한, 실내의 각 공간과 시설물의 기하정보와 위상정보를 기반으로 이동약자의 접근성 및 통행 가능성을 정량화하기 위한 접근성 지수를 설계하였다. 다음으로, 스캔 도면을 입력하여 이동약자용 실내 그래프 데이터베이스 구축을 위한 프로세스를 제안하였다. 제안한 프로세스는 전이학습 기반 접근 방식을 통해 스캔 도면에서 공간의 구조 정보를 추출하고, 토폴로지 추출 및 접근성 평가를 통해 이동약자용 네트워크 모델을 생성하며, 생성한 네트워크 모델을 그래프 데이터베이스로 자동 변환하는 과정을 포함한다. 구체적으로, 제안 프로세스는 수정된 ResNet 기반의 모델을 새롭게 라벨링한 도면으로 미세 조정하여 사용함으로써 실내 구조맵을 생성한다. 이후 추출된 객체들의 공간 관계를 기반으로 각 공간을 노드와 링크로 표현한 실내 네트워크 모델을 구축한다. 각 공간의 접근성 정보는 제안된 접근성 지수와 임계값을 사용하여 생성된 후 데이터베이스에 저장되어, 이동약자를 위한 접근 가능한 그래프 추출에 활용될 수 있다. 본 연구에서는 제안한 기법을 서울대학교 도면 데이터 셋에 적용하여 이동약자용 실내 그래프 데이터베이스를 구축하고 평가하였다. 구축한 실내 그래프 데이터베이스를 활용하여 다층 경로 계획과 실내외 연계 경로 계획의 2가지 시나리오에 따라 최적 경로를 도출하였다. 그 결과, 일반 보행자의 최적 경로와 비교하여 이동약자용 최적 경로는 가까운 계단이 아닌 엘리베이터를 통한 수직 이동을 포함하였을 뿐만 아니라 접근 불가능한 공간을 회피하도록 도출되었다. 즉, 제안한 기법을 통해 이동약자 측면에서 통행 장애 정보를 포함하여 실내 환경을 적절하게 묘사하는 데이터베이스의 구축이 가능함을 확인할 수 있었다. 또한, 출입로로 명명된 관계 생성만으로 스케일이나 좌표 변환 없이 실내외 연계 경로 계획이 가능하였는데, 이는 독립적인 데이터 간 연계 사용에 적합한 그래프 데이터베이스의 특성을 반영한 결과로 판단할 수 있다. 본 연구의 주요 기여는 스캔한 도면을 사용하여 이동약자용 실내 그래프 데이터베이스를 구축하기 위한 프로세스를 개발한 것이다. 구체적으로, 이동약자의 이동에 초점을 두고 설계한 데이터 모델을 기반으로 한 데이터베이스 구축이 가능하므로 이동약자용 실내 길안내 서비스에 활용될 수 있다. 또한, 토폴로지 구축 및 그래프 데이터베이스로의 변환을 위한 하위 프로시져를 개발하였으며, 제안 프로세스는 해당 프로시져들로 구성되어 도면 입력을 통해 이동약자용 실내 그래프 데이터베이스 구축을 가능하게 한다. 해당 하위 프로시져들은 자동으로 수행될 수 있어 데이터베이스 구축 시 소요되는 시간과 비용을 절감할 수 있다. 또한, 다양한 정형 및 비정형 데이터의 연계에 적합한 그래프 데이터베이스의 특징에 의해, 제안한 프로세스를 통해 구축한 실내 데이터베이스는 기존 공간 모델의 기능을 포함하면서 다양한 유형의 길안내 서비스에 활용될 수 있을 것으로 기대된다.Changes to the indoor environment have increased social interest in ensuring the mobility of people with disabilities. Therefore, the demand for customized indoor routing services for people with mobility disabilities (PWMD), who have many travel restrictions, is increasing. These services have progressed from spatial routing to personalized routing, which reflects personal preferences and experiences in planning an optimal path. In this regard, it is necessary to generate a database for PWMD with a flexible schema suitable for the efficient manipulation and processing of data. This study aims to propose a technique of generating an indoor graph database for PWMD using scanned floor plans. First, a conceptual data model was developed by deriving relevant indoor features and influential factors, considering various international regulations on indoor environments. Also, the accessibility index was designed based on the data model to quantify the difficulties in accessing spaces based on each indoor spaces geometric characteristics. Next, a three-stage process was proposed: retrieving the structure of spaces from scanned floor plans through a transfer learning-based approach, retrieving topology and assessing accessibility for creating an indoor network model for PWMD, and converting the network model into a graph database. Specifically, an indoor structure map is created by fine-tuning the modified Resnet-based model with newly annotated floor plans for extracting structure information. Also, based on the spatial relationship of the extracted features, the indoor network model was created by abstracting indoor spaces with nodes and links. The accessibility of each space is determined by the proposed indices and thresholds; thereby, a feasible network for PWMD could be derived. Then, a process was developed for automatically converting an indoor network model, including accessibility property, into a graph database. The proposed technique was applied to the Seoul National University dataset to generate an indoor graph database for PWMD. Two scenario-based routing tests were conducted using the generated database to verify the utility of results: multi-floor routing and integrated indoor-outdoor routing. As a result, compared with the path for general pedestrians, the optimal path for PWMD was derived by avoiding inaccessible spaces, including vertical movement using elevators rather than the nearest stairs. In other words, applying the proposed technique, a database that adequately described an indoor environment in terms of PWMD with sufficient mobile constraint information could be constructed. Moreover, an integrated indoor-outdoor routing could be conducted by only creating an entrance-labeled relationship, without scale and coordinate transformation. This result reflects the usability of the generated graph database and its suitability regarding the incorporation of multiple individual data sources. The main contribution lies in the development of the process for generating an indoor graph database for PWMD using scanned floor plans. In particular, the database for PWMD routing can be generated based on the proposed data model with PWMD-related features and factors. Also, sub-procedures for topology retrieval and graph database conversion are developed to generate the indoor graph database by the end-to-end process. The developed sub-procedures are performed automatically, thereby reducing the required times and costs. It is expected that the target database of the proposed process can be generated considering utilization for various types of routing since the graph database is easily integrated with multiple types of information while covering the existing spatial models function.1. Introduction 1 1.1 Objectives and contributions 1 1.2 Related works 7 1.2.1 Indoor environment conceptualization 7 1.2.2 Indoor data construction 11 1.2.3 Accessibility assessment 19 1.3 Research scope and flow 22 2. Conceptual modeling 26 2.1 Relevant features and factors 28 2.2 Proposed data model 30 2.3 Space accessibility for PWMD 36 2.3.1 Influential factors within indoor environments 37 2.3.2 Accessibility index 41 3. Indoor graph database for PWMD from scanned floor plans 43 3.1 Retrieving structure of indoor spaces 43 3.1.1 Pre-trained model for detecting indoor geometry 45 3.1.2 Dataset with new annotation 47 3.1.3 Transfer learning-based approach 52 3.2 Generating the indoor network model for PWMD 56 3.2.1 Definition of nodes and links in the network model 60 3.2.2 The classification rule of space polygons 63 3.2.3 Connection between general spaces and doors 68 3.2.4 Node-link generation for horizontal transition spaces 71 3.2.5 Vertical link generation 75 3.2.6 Connectivity and accessibility information generation 79 3.3 Indoor graph database for PWMD 80 3.3.1 Graph representation of indoor environments 80 3.3.2 Conversion of network model into graph database 83 3.4 Entire process 87 4. Experiment and results 89 4.1 Experimental setup and test data 89 4.2 Evaluation for retrieved information 92 4.2.1 Results of structure retrieval 92 4.2.2 Results of topology retrieval 99 4.3 Generated indoor graph database for PWMD 128 4.3.1 Results of the indoor graph database for PWMD 128 4.3.2 Query-based routing 136 5. Conclusion 147 References 150 Appendix 166 국문초록 178박

Intelligent evacuation management systems: A review

Crowd and evacuation management have been active areas of research and study in the recent past. Various developments continue to take place in the process of efficient evacuation of crowds in mass gatherings. This article is intended to provide a review of intelligent evacuation management systems covering the aspects of crowd monitoring, crowd disaster prediction, evacuation modelling, and evacuation path guidelines. Soft computing approaches play a vital role in the design and deployment of intelligent evacuation applications pertaining to crowd control management. While the review deals with video and nonvideo based aspects of crowd monitoring and crowd disaster prediction, evacuation techniques are reviewed via the theme of soft computing, along with a brief review on the evacuation navigation path. We believe that this review will assist researchers in developing reliable automated evacuation systems that will help in ensuring the safety of the evacuees especially during emergency evacuation scenarios

Hybrid intelligent decision support system for distributed detection based on ad hoc integrated WSN & RFID

This thesis was submitted for the award of Doctor of Philosophy and was awarded by Brunel University LondonThe real time monitoring of environment context aware activities, based on distributed detection, is becoming a standard in public safety and service delivery in a wide range of domains (child and elderly care and supervision, logistics, circulation, and other). The safety of people, goods and premises depends on the prompt immediate reaction to potential hazards identified in real time, at an early stage to engage appropriate control actions. Effective emergency response can be supported only by available and acquired expertise or elaborate collaborative knowledge in the domain of distributed detection that include indoor sensing, tracking and localizing. This research proposes a hybrid conceptual multi-agent framework for the acquisition of collaborative knowledge in dynamic complex context aware environments for distributed detection. This framework has been applied for the design and development of a hybrid intelligent multi-agent decision system (HIDSS) that supports a decentralized active sensing, tracking and localizing strategy, and the deployment and configuration of smart detection devices associated to active sensor nodes wirelessly connected in a network topology to configure, deploy and control ad hoc wireless sensor networks (WSNs). This system, which is based on the interactive use of data, models and knowledge base, has been implemented to support fire detection and control access fusion functions aimed at elaborating: An integrated data model, grouping the building information data and WSN-RFID database, composed of the network configuration and captured data, A virtual layout configuration of the controlled premises, based on using a building information model, A knowledge-based support for the design of generic detection devices, A multi-criteria decision making model for generic detection devices distribution, ad hoc WSNs configuration, clustering and deployment, and Predictive data models for evacuation planning, and fire and evacuation simulation. An evaluation of the system prototype has been carried out to enrich information and knowledge fusion requirements and show the scope of the concepts used in data and process modelling. It has shown the practicability of hybrid solutions grouping generic homogeneous smart detection devices enhanced by heterogeneous support devices in their deployment, forming ad hoc networks that integrate WSNs and radio frequency identification (RFID) technology. The novelty in this work is the web-based support system architecture proposed in this framework that is based on the use of intelligent agent modelling and multi-agent systems, and the decoupling of the processes supporting the multi-sensor data fusion from those supporting different context applications. Although this decoupling is essential to appropriately distribute the different fusion functions, the integration of several dimensions of policy settings for the modelling of knowledge processes, and intelligent and pro-active decision making activities, requires the organisation of interactive fusion functions deployed upstream to a safety and emergency response.Saudi government, represented by the Ministry of Interior and General Directorate of Civil Defenc

Analytic prioritization of indoor routes for search and rescue operations in hazardous environments

Applications to prioritize indoor routes for emergency situations in a complex built facility have been restricted to building simulations and network approaches. These types of applications often failed to account for the complexity and trade-offs needed to select the optimal indoor path during an emergency situation. In this article, we propose a step change for finding the optimal routes for Search And Rescue (SAR) teams in a building, where a multi-epicentre extreme event is occurring. We have developed an algorithm that is based on a novel approach integrating the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP), statistical characteristics, the propagation of hazard, Duckham-Kulik’s adapted algorithm, Dijkstra's classical algorithm, and the binary search with three criteria: hazard proximity, distance/travel time, and route complexity. The sub-criteria for the route complexity are validated in the context of SAR using a real-life building (Doha World Trade Centre). The important feature of the algorithm is its ability to generate an optimal route depending on user’s needs. The findings revealed that the generated optimal routes are indeed the ‘best’ trade-off amongst distance/travel time, hazard proximity and route complexity. The test results also demonstrated the robustness of the algorithm with respect to different parameters, and its insensitivity to different scenarios of uncontrolled evacuation

Interactive virtual indoor navigation system using visual recognition and pedestrian dead reckoning techniques

Finding a destination in an unfamiliar indoor environment requires cumbersome effort to refer to a physical floor plan or directory to locate the intended destination. With the advancements of mobile technologies, a navigational system using mobile computing devices such as mobile phone or tablet could aid users in locating the desired destination with ease. This paper presented an interactive virtual indoor navigation system which is developed for Sunway University campus. In order to provide an interactive and context-sensitive navigation platform, a hybrid solution has been proposed by blending the sensor capabilities on the mobile devices to work in an indoor environment. These sensors include utilizing the built-in accelerometer, compass and camera capabilities to create an interactive content of indoor navigation system using visual recognition and pedestrian dead reckoning for Augmented Reality (AR). Furthermore, user satisfaction and feedback survey have been collected for further improvement the proposed solution