Research on improving the efficiency of small group emergency evacuation in theme parks under the synergy of information transmission and space optimization

Abstract The unique single-entry, multi-exit layout of theme parks, low visitor familiarity with the environment, and small-group travel patterns make information signage and group information transmission crucial for emergency evacuations. Existing research has insufficiently examined the relationship between dynamic information dissemination and environmental chaos in large outdoor settings, the interplay between signage location and group information sharing, and the time delay in path reconstruction caused by visitor entrance dependence. This research constructs a small-group cellular automaton model that considers the synergistic effects of information transmission and signage. The small-group information transmission mechanism is refined into a two-layer model of "internal complete sharing with external trust dependence," and chaos entropy is introduced to quantify the environmental constraints on information dissemination. The research shows that group trust has an inverted U-shaped effect on evacuation efficiency, with an optimal range of 0.4-0.6. Spatial optimization of signage placement is superior to stacking signage, and a centrally clustered layout can significantly reduce costs while maintaining efficient evacuation. The presence of a geometrically central emergency exit can improve evacuation efficiency by 40%-60%. This improvement magnitude is associated with the degree of matching among site scale, exit capacity, and the capacity of connecting passages. This research emphasizes the collaborative improvement of evacuation efficiency and safety through information regulation, spatial optimization, and network resilience design, providing a behavioral basis for the safety design of large-scale theme parks.