Although the hurricane season just began June 1, state and federal officials -- and the agencies they hire -- are working around the clock to keep their evacuation models up to date.
To do so, it takes money and countless divisions and consulting firms to tweak or update the state's models. But that kind of planning has paid off for the Sunshine State, which experienced relatively few problems handling evacuees during 2004 and 2005 when the state was pummeled by numerous storms.
"Evacuation planning is a lot more complex than getting a senior politician on the microphone and telling the public to get the hell out of Dodge," says Rob Vining, who serves as HNTB Federal Services' vice president and national leader for hurricane preparedness, response and recovery.
That planning, Vining says, comes on many levels and requires constant communication. Evacuation planning is the primary responsibility of local governments and counties, which work in collaboration with the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the U.S. Corps of Army Engineers.
Orlando Business Journal this week talked with the agencies and officials helping update the evacuation models to get a behind-the-scenes look at the complexities involved.
Local evacuation updates
Orange County Emergency Management Director Preston Cook updates the county's emergency plan annually in-house on a budget of $1 million.
"Our evacuation plan consists of constant coordination with the Orange County Sheriff's Office, Florida Highway Patrol and the Florida Department of Transportation," Cook says. "We sit down and go through what schools and other buildings will be used as shelters."
Constant meetings with the American Red Cross, Orange County Health Department and transportation partners such as Lynx are also necessary, he says.
County evacuation models are usually updated every three to five years and can cost $30,000 or less depending upon the size and population of the county, according to Don Lewis, vice president and division manager of evacuation planning with PBS&J.
The latest Volusia County study prepared a few years ago, he says, shows that it could take nine to 12 hours to evacuate the county for a Category 1 storm and 19 hours for a Category 4 or 5 storm.
"You are talking anywhere from 40,000 to 100,000 vehicles evacuating Volusia County alone," Lewis says. "The real issue is how many people will hit the road and where to send them."
Lewis and his division of five people tweak evacuation plans, count cars and also deal with the recovery teams that go in after a storm.
Currently, he says, $2 million to $3 million a year is available in federal funding for hurricane preparedness.
Patrick Odom, hurricane program manager for the Florida Division of Emergency Management, says evacuation studies are updated as often as possible, but he admits some are older because of funding issues.
A statewide annual mock hurricane evacuation also helps counties prepare for the real thing. All counties track a mock storm and test resources.
For Orange County and other inland areas, Odom says not many scenarios would require the evacuation of all residents, "but we still come up with mock scenarios for the annual exercise that can include tornadoes that can pop up."
Making strides
Lewis says many strides have been made in evacuation planning.
He points to the more than 3 million people along Florida's southeast coast that were evacuated during Hurricane Floyd in 1999 as a lesson that planners will never forget.
"People evacuated in all directions, and no one knew where to go and the traffic was a nightmare," Lewis says. "That was a horrendous evacuation."
Today, better technology like the Evacuation Traffic Information System has been set up along the eastern coastline so states can tap into it and inform others how they are evacuating.
"The model will then spit out what the projected congestion would be across state lines," Lewis says.
Lewis and PBS&J's main project right now is a computer program developed internally called HURREVAC, which takes real-time meteorological characteristics of storms and shows projected paths. Then, the program calculates clearance times and how long it will take to evacuate.
Both state and county officials use HURREVAC throughout the year to work on possible scenarios, Lewis says.
David Gwynn, vice president of HNTB Corp. in Lake Mary, helped design a $3.78 million intelligent transportation system that was put in a rural area along State Road 528, near State Road 520 all the way east to Interstate 95.
The project allows a direct communication line to that area by having 12 cameras above ground and multiple sensors in the pavement to count cars and the speed they are going.
Data signs also tell drivers if they should come to Orlando and if there are any hotel rooms left -- or redirects them farther to the north.
The system, which was in use before the 2003 hurricane season, will eventually be expanded as far north as Daytona and as far south as the Melbourne-Palm Bay area, Gwynn says.
Always lessons to be learned
But even with all the new technology and evacuation models, Vining says "if there is a lesson we have learned from the past, it's that we are vulnerable no matter what."
And while Vining says it's clear that Florida is miles ahead in its planning, there are always opportunities to improve.
"This country has always been known for responding well," he says, "and it's time we become known for preparing even better."