Understanding the impacts of transportation policies on different socioeconomic groups is a crucial part of ensuring equity in the overall transportation planning process. However, despite substantial research on the socioeconomic impacts of transportation in various contexts, there has been relatively little discussion of their potential influence on the provision of disaster relief. Following recent catastrophic natural disasters and terrorist acts around the world, transportation for disaster relief has become an increasingly important area of research. This paper focuses on the situation of providing disaster relief following a hurricane. Using a spatial model developed to site distribution facilities for relief goods, this paper investigates the differential impacts of various relief facility location decisions on socioeconomically disadvantaged groups. The model is formulated and solved using spatial data for a mid-size city in the Southeastern U.S. Results of the analysis point out the differential accessibility to relief goods that may be experienced by population groups and suggest that consideration of socioeconomic status in future disaster relief decision making is warranted
Samenvatting