Resilience of transport systems under disaster: Simulation-based analysis of 2011 tsunami in Japan

Improving infrastructural systems' resilience to limit consequences of catastrophic and disruptive events is a major concern for policy makers and private operators. The aim of this work, developed within an international research project named Collaboration Management of Airports at Catastrophe (CMAC), is to capitalize on what the dramatic experience of March 2011 tsunami in Japan demonstrated. In particular the Yamagata airport case study was examined by means of a discrete events simulation model that represents the Yamagata airport and the related ground regional transportation system, and describes in great detail operational aspects and management dimensions of the system. To provide transport system managers and policy makers with a diagnostic and decision support tool, a simulation campaign was conducted to map all the critical resources and analyze their contribution to the resilience performance of the system.