A Review of the Research Methods on Vulnerability of Transportation System

The reliability of transportation networks has been a hot topic in international society since the Kobe earthquake in 1995. A great deal of research on how to realize the reliability of transportation system has been carried out in the academic community. Vulnerability research is one of the important aspects thereof, which focuses where the key parts of the transportation system are and what influences will be imposed on the lifeline if the transportation system is destroyed. This paper summarizes the research literature on the vulnerability of the transportation system since 2002 and extracts the research methods used. The paper classifies the research methods into three categories: network-topology-based vulnerability research, accessibility-based vulnerability research, and mathematical model-based vulnerability research. The paper details the above vulnerability research methods and the related research literature and points out their advantages and disadvantages in order to inspire the relevant researchers in this field.