Modeling Destination Choice in Hurricane Evacuation with an Intervening Opportunity Model

In this study, a trip distribution model for hurricane evacuation using the intervening opportunity method was developed. Post Hurricane Floyd survey data was used for model calibration and comparison. To model the behavior that people tend to evacuate away from the path of the hurricane, a new concept of equal destination attractiveness was introduced and an extended intervening opportunity model was built on this basis and implemented in TransCAD. The gravity model, intervening opportunity model and its extended version were compared using several statistical measures. This study demonstrates that it is possible to use the intervening opportunity theory to model trip distribution in hurricane evacuation. The results also show that the gravity model performs slightly better than intervening opportunity model, while the extended intervening opportunity model performs the best among the three models.