Post-earthquake resilience assessment and long-term restoration prioritization of transportation network

An efficient and safe transportation system is essential to communities during the long-term recovery period after earthquakes. A disrupted transportation network due to infrastructure damage or failure affects the functionality of the traffic system and poses increased traffic safety risks. A rational assessment of the traffic network performance in terms of both traffic efficiency and safety cannot only provide comprehensive quantification of system resilience, but also enable more risk-informed post-hazard recovery planning. A new methodology to assess the resilience performance of transportation networks during post-earthquake long-term recovery period is developed in this study with two main innovative contributions: (1) modeling the traffic performance of partially closed road segments in the network simulation and optimization, which offers useful tool to capture the time-progressive recovery process; and (2) integrating both traffic efficiency and safety into the resilience assessment and recovery prioritization. After a resilience indicator is introduced to characterize the overall traffic efficiency and safety of the transportation network using probabilistic sampling method, a new restoration priority measure is proposed to support post-earthquake restoration of damaged bridges. A demonstrative study is conducted on a hypothetical network system located in an earthquake-prone area.