Scaling laws for the movement of people between locations in a large city

Details Scaling laws for the movement of people between locations in a large city Scaling laws for the movement of people between locations in a large city

2005-03-02

arxiv.org/abs/physics/0503023v1

Physical Review E 68, 066102 (2003)

Physics

Physics and Society

18 pages, 10 figures

Scientific paper

10.1103/PhysRevE.68.066102

Large scale simulations of the movements of people in a ``virtual'' city and their analyses are used to generate new insights into understanding the dynamic processes that depend on the interactions between people. Models, based on these interactions, can be used in optimizing traffic flow, slowing the spread of infectious diseases or predicting the change in cell phone usage in a disaster. We analyzed cumulative and aggregated data generated from the simulated movements of 1.6 million individuals in a computer (pseudo agent-based) model during a typical day in Portland, Oregon. This city is mapped into a graph with $181,206$ nodes representing physical locations such as buildings. Connecting edges model individual's flow between nodes. Edge weights are constructed from the daily traffic of individuals moving between locations. The number of edges leaving a node (out-degree), the edge weights (out-traffic), and the edge-weights per location (total out-traffic) are fitted well by power law distributions. The power law distributions also fit subgraphs based on work, school, and social/recreational activities. The resulting weighted graph is a ``small world'' and has scaling laws consistent with an underlying hierarchical structure. We also explore the time evolution of the largest connected component and the distribution of the component sizes. We observe a strong linear correlation between the out-degree and total out-traffic distributions and significant levels of clustering. We discuss how these network features can be used to characterize social networks and their relationship to dynamic processes.

Affiliated with

Also associated with

No associations

Rating

Scaling laws for the movement of people between locations in a large city does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this scientific paper.

If you have personal experience with Scaling laws for the movement of people between locations in a large city, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and Scaling laws for the movement of people between locations in a large city will most certainly appreciate the feedback.

Rate now

Comments { 0 }

Profile ID: LFWR-SCP-O-284245