Selection of Emergency Assembly Points: A Case Study for the Expected Istanbul Earthquake

Disasters have devastating effects on socioeconomic status, the built environment, and infrastructure of the cities; also, they lead to complex and ambiguous disaster management processes that are hard to manage. Therefore, developing a proper disaster management strategy is crucial. Selecting appropriate emergency assembly points (EAPs) as well as shelter areas and routing habitants to the EAPs and shelter areas are essential in disaster management, especially for the densely populated cities. These processes need a multidisciplinary approach involving different stakeholders. The aim of this study is to better understand the criteria related to the selection of EAPs and design a decision support system (DSS) for policy-makers of the city. As a multi-criteria decision problem, selection of the most appropriate areas in terms of location, capacity, resources, allocation of victims, and evacuation route principles is formulated in a mixed-method model using Geographic Information System (GIS) and The Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP). Gaziosmanpaşa district within the area of the expected Istanbul earthquake is chosen as a case study to demonstrate the implementation of the proposed model. Results indicated that improvements were achieved on comprehensiveness among population, averaged evacuation distance traveled by the victims, and reaching times of the affected victims to the emergency assembly points when compared to the current situation.