The impact of pedestrian bridge layout on occupant evacuation in teaching buildings

This study examines the impact of pedestrian bridge layout on occupant evacuation in teaching buildings by utilizing Revit and Pathfinder software for modeling and simulation. Taking a middle school teaching building as an example, the building was modeled using Revit software and then imported into Pathfinder software. Personnel parameters and behaviors were set to establish an emergency evacuation model for the teaching building. Various scenarios were analyzed, including the closure and opening of pedestrian bridges, the location of pedestrian bridges, and the number of people using the pedestrian bridges, to investigate the impact of pedestrian bridge layout on occupant evacuation. The results indicated that when pedestrian bridges were open, the overall evacuation efficiency was improved. When pedestrian bridges were located on different floors of the teaching building, the improvement in evacuation efficiency was not significant for the lowest and highest floors, but when located on the fifth floor, the overall evacuation efficiency increased by 8.5%, with a gradual decrease in efficiency for floors below the fifth. When the number of people using the pedestrian bridges exceeded 60%, pedestrian bridge passages became congested, leading to a more noticeable difference in evacuation time. Therefore, in situations of dense occupant evacuation, it is necessary to reasonably disperse the crowd according to actual conditions to reduce personnel density, thereby shortening evacuation time. The findings of this study provide a basis for the design and management of pedestrian bridge buildings.