Title: Scenario-based stochastic shelter location-allocation problem with vulnerabilities for disaster relief network design

Authors: Sweety Hansuwa; Usha Mohan; Viswanath Kumar Ganesan

Addresses: Department of Management Studies, Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Chennai – 600036, India ' Department of Management Studies, Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Chennai – 600036, India ' TCS Research and Innovation, Tata Consultancy Services Ltd., IIT Madras Research Park, Taramani, Chennai – 600113, India

Abstract: We formulate the shelter location-allocation problem considering the vulnerability of the demand locations and their network connectivities with the shelter locations for disaster management's preparedness and response phase. We propose a scenario-based stochastic model that assigns the set of candidate locations evaluating operational, budgetary limitations, and service level expectations. The solution presents an evacuee-allocation plan considering the best collection of less vulnerable network connectivities between the demand areas and the shelter locations. We present a linear relaxation heuristic and compare the heuristic performance with the scenario-based formulation solved using CPLEX 12.8 optimisation solver for various problem sizes. We finally apply and solve the problem using real-life case data obtained during the major flooding event in and around the Chennai Metropolitan Development Area during 2015 to present our model's applicability and emergency response requirements. [Submitted: 12 November 2020; Accepted: 19 April 2021]

Keywords: disaster management; shelter location-allocation; stochastic programming; linear relaxation heuristic.

DOI: 10.1504/EJIE.2022.125296

European Journal of Industrial Engineering, 2022 Vol.16 No.5, pp.507 - 530

Received: 12 Nov 2020
Accepted: 19 Apr 2021

Published online: 06 Sep 2022 *

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