Experimental Study of Phase Transition in Pedestrian Flow

TL;DR

This study investigates phase transitions in pedestrian flow within a simple evacuation setup, analyzing how inflow affects system states and providing microscopic travel time insights through experiments and image processing.

Contribution

It presents experimental evidence of phase transitions in pedestrian flow and identifies critical inflow values for congestion onset.

Findings

Critical inflow values for phase transition identified

Microscopic travel time analysis conducted

Transition from low density to congested state characterized

Abstract

The transition between low and high density phases is a typical feature of systems with social interactions. This contribution focuses on simple evacuation design of one room with one entrance and one exit; four passing-through experiments were organized and evaluated by means of automatic image processing. The phase of the system, determined by travel time and occupancy, is evaluated with respect to the inflow, a controlled boundary condition. Critical values of inflow and outflow were described with respect to the transition from low density to congested state. Moreover, microscopic analysis of travel time is provided.