Macroscopic Fundamental Diagram for pedestrian networks: Theory and applications

Abstract

The Macroscopic Fundamental diagram (MFD) has proven to be a powerful concept in understanding and managing vehicular network dynamics, both from a theoretical angle and from a more application-oriented perspective. In this contribution, we explore the existence and the characteristics of the pedestrian Macroscopic Fundamental Diagram (p-MFD). From a theoretical perspective, the main contribution of this research shows how we can derive the p-MFD from assumed local fundamental diagrams (FDs). We show that we can relate the average (out-) flow from a pedestrian network as a function of the average spatial density ρ and the density spatial variation σ2. We show that the latter is essential to ..