Jeff Georgevich – Senior Program Coordinator
Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC)
101 8th St.
Oakland, CA 94607
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Evacuation Plan Status: What is the status of your agency’s existing evacuation plan? For example, when was it first developed and when was it last revised? Has it ever been used in an actual emergency situation? Who has the authority to issue evacuation orders?
Trans Response Plan is the transportation plan that Bay Area transportation agencies are currently using for all emergencies including evacuations. It was first developed in 1997, and has been tested every year since then. There has not been an actual emergency situation that has activated the Trans Response. MTC as a transportation agency does not have the authority to issue evacuation orders. The Governor’s Office of Emergency Services (OES) is the agency to make that decision for the Bay Area. -
Scope of the Plan: What is the scope of the plan with regard to geographic coverage, agency involvement, and presence of transportation elements? Are plans for evacuation transportation management separate from or a part of the general emergency plan?
The Plan covers the nine counties including the 12 largest transportation agencies in the entire Bay Area. Planning for evacuation transportation is part of the Trans Response Plan. The purpose of the Trans Response Plan is to coordinate the response to any regional emergency by the region’s transportation agencies, and ensure that the transportation agencies coordinate with the state and county offices of emergency services. -
Plan Scenarios: What types of scenarios are the plans meant to address? Can they be applied to no-notice, advance-notice, and/or special event emergency evacuations? Do they have provisions for naturally occurring, accidental, and/or terrorist events?
The plan focuses on no-notice emergencies, particularly severe earthquakes. Terrorism emergencies are also addressed in the plan. -
Capacity Needs and Availability: Have any models, computer simulations, or other calculations been performed to estimate capacity needs of the transportation system during an evacuation? How much additional capacity is expected to result from emergency measures that are to be put in place (e.g., contraflow lanes, signal pattern changes)?
No mathematical models, computer simulations, or other calculations have been used for the plan. Caltrans may have computer models to assist in emergency response capacity analysis. The capacity of evacuation routes primarily depends on the type and magnitude of the disaster as well as the disaster location. For example, the collapse of any of the bay bridges caused by a disastrous earthquake will severely impact the evacuation capacity from San Francisco. -
Traffic Control Practices: What is the role of transportation agencies in traffic management and control? What traffic control practices are designated by the plan for use in an evacuation? Examples include pre-established evacuation routes, contraflow, evacuation phasing, regulation of type or number of vehicles (including transit), optimization of signal patterns and lane use, mitigation of work zone impacts, and suspension of tolls and fares.
MTC does not have the authority to control traffic, which is controlled by law enforcement agencies, or to issue commands to transportation agencies. Instead, MTC relies on cooperation and mutual assistance between agencies. For example, during an emergency evacuation, MTC may suggest that transit agencies waive fares, and that transit agencies send buses to help CHP to enforce certain temporary traffic closures by using the buses as a physical barrier to close roads. -
Role of ITS: What intelligent transportation system (ITS) components and other related traffic management tools are used in the evacuation plan? How, when, and why are they each used as part of the evacuation plan? Do you have redundant systems? Can you operate the ITS elements from any location other than the TMC? Examples of ITS components include surveillance cameras, variable message signs (VMS), highway advisory radio (HAR), 511 or other traveler information systems (phone and/or Web), interconnected traffic signal systems, high-occupancy vehicle (HOV) lanes, ramp metering, traffic signal priority for buses, and vehicle detection systems.
As the region’s transportation planning agency, MTC does not own or operate any ITS devices. However, during an emergency, MTC will send staff to Caltrans, who has traffic surveillance and control devices, to collect region-wide real-time traffic information. MTC will also call for information from all the transit agencies and ferry services in the region regarding their current situation, needed resources and urgent needs, and resources that they can share. This information is filed into standard forms and sent to MTC through phone or fax. MTC’s Emergency Operation Center will follow a checklist of tasks to compile a Regional Situation Summary for transportation, share that summary with transportation and emergency agencies, and coordinate the emergency response according to the information in the summary.
The 511 system is located in the Caltrans Headquarters Building, very close to the Caltrans Emergency Operations Center, and currently operated by contractors. At this point, 511 staff are not part of the Caltrans EOC, but Caltrans and 511 may send staff to assist each other during an emergency; this topic is under preliminary discussion. -
Resources and Materials: What is the role of transportation agencies in identifying resource needs and in providing resources or materials? How do they assist in transportation service coordination?
MTC will collect information regarding resources and manpower from all the transit agencies in the Bay Area. MTC will also disseminate this information to all the agencies (transportation and emergency management) so that they will know who to contact and what to request. -
Evacuation Control, Coordination, and Management: Is an incident command system (ICS) used? How are transportation needs and resources, and the role of transportation agencies, integrated into the ICS? How are operations coordinated between TMCs, transit agencies, EOCs, and other agencies? Do you have plans for the re-entry of evacuees after the evacuation? How do you accommodate special needs evacuees (seniors, nursing home residents, hospital patients, inmates, people with pets, etc.)?
The plan complies with ICS. The plan also complies with the California Standardized Emergency Management System (SEMS) and the Federal NIMS. No re-entry issues are addressed in the plan currently. Evacuation of those with special needs is critical and currently the responsibility of the Office of Emergency Service (OES), in each county and in the Governor’s Office. -
Communications Between Agencies: What are the communications protocols between agencies? Are there established procedures for disseminating information quickly and accurately to personnel?
The consistent communication system is ensured by physical communication such as phone and fax between MTC and the 12 agencies. Communications through phone and fax may experience overload problems during an emergency. The transportation agencies have an emergency radio system, but the mountaintop receivers are vulnerable. Therefore, MTC will procure satellite phones for the 12 agencies plus the 9 Offices of Emergency Services in the next few months to enhance the emergency communication reliability and quality. -
Communications with Evacuees: Is the public educated in advance about the evacuation procedures? What information is provided and how is the information disseminated? Do transportation agencies have a specific role in media coordination and traveler information dissemination, either before or during an evacuation? Is information coordinated between agencies and/or centralized before being delivered to the media?
The Bay Area general public is well aware of earthquakes, due to countless media reports on experiences during the 1906 earthquake. General media such as radio is usually used to inform the public in emergency situations. MTC will provide transportation information and media-advisory suggestions to the Governor’s Office/Office of Emergency Services, which will release them. MTC will also send staff to the OES for face-to-face communication. MTC and the transportation agencies will also deal directly with the media. -
Testing and Training Procedures: How often are testing/training exercises conducted? Who do these exercises involve? What drill scenarios have been used?
Testing and training exercises are conducted every year. They involve all the 12 major transportation agencies in the Bay Area activating their EOCs. Right after the training, agencies will debrief and make action plans for the next year. -
Evaluation of Exercises: What aspects of the evacuation plan were implemented well in drill situations, and what aspects of the plan were found to require improvement? What elements of the plan were most useful for a successful evacuation drill? What lessons have been learned as a result of these drills?
The region-wide data collection and coordination procedure has proven to be successful in the Plan. Communication system needs more investment for enhanced reliability and simultaneous multi-agency communication. -
Evaluation of Evacuations: If the evacuation plan has ever been used in an actual evacuation, how successful was its implementation? To what extent was the evacuation simply monitored, rather than managed, by responding agencies? What aspects of the plan were implemented well in the actual emergency situation, and what aspects were found to require improvement? What elements of the plan were most useful for a successful evacuation?
The Plan has not been used for an actual emergency yet. -
After-Action Report: What is the process for post-evacuation evaluation? Is the post-incident review a collaborative effort among all agencies that were involved?
Immediately following training and testing each year, the participating agencies are required to fill reporting forms and identify issues that came up during testing. The 12 agencies will each send a report, and MTC will compile them into a complete region-level document with action items identified. -
Incorporation of Lessons Learned: Have the lessons learned in testing/training exercises and in real evacuations resulted in revisions to the emergency evacuation plan? Have the lessons learned resulted in changes in personnel training?
The group testing the plan has not been changed. Lessons learned in testing are quickly solved and corrected in the plan. For example, faxes from MTC to local agencies were verified by sending and receiving an extra copy to MTC itself. This practice could not reveal those fax failures at other agencies caused by out-of-paper problem. MTC identified the failure so that MTC staff could try other ways to reach the local agencies. -
Conclusions: What specific recommendations do you have regarding management of traffic during evacuations for another agency developing or improving upon their own emergency evacuation plans?
Depending on the disaster type, evacuation is not always the best choice, or even feasible. The evacuation routing is also difficult if the transportation network is damaged during the disaster. Therefore, sufficient planning for shelter-in-place is needed to complement the evacuation planning.
Increasing roadway capacity through emergency contraflow is hard for no-notice emergencies because the time needed to set up the contraflow, including controls at each ramp along the highway, will take at least half day.
June 26, 2006
Publication #FHWA-HOP-08-016
