Extraordinary occurrences, be they large-scale activities, incidents with major losses or disaster situations, imperil the reliable functioning of the transport system. At the same time, this system plays a crucial role during and after such events: relief teams depend on the traffic infrastructure to ensure their ability to provide transport and organize relief logistics. The population’s freedom of movement also has to be maintained to the extent possible.
Public offices and organisations with security responsibilities as well as traffic authorities are called on to take measures to deal with these events while assuring basic mobility. However, Germany lacks an institutionalized joint traffic management system, which means that it is necessary for these various actors to make ad hoc arrangements to share information and coordinate measures.
In the VABENE++ project, powerful tools are being developed to aid public offices and organisations with security responsibilities as well as traffic authorities when dealing with disasters and large public events. The goal is to efficiently manage the required rescue logistics and the nearby traffic flow even under extreme conditions, thereby enabling response teams to rapidly reach the locations where they are needed. Scientists from various DLR institutes collaborate in this research project with the support of DLR’s Research Flight Facilities. The Chair of Remote Sensing Technology at Munich Technical University (TU München) and the Department of Geoinformatics and Remote Sensing at Osnabrück University also participate in VABENE++. Research focuses on such areas as simulation and large-scale traffic modelling, aerial traffic monitoring, traffic risk assessment, data fusion, data management, and further developing Web technologies in a GIS environment.