Open Source Evac4BIM Revit Add-In Developed at Lund University

Nazim Yakhou et al. have published their paper titled "Development Of The 'Evac4BIM' Add-In for Revit" via FEMTC which is freely available to read, watch, and download. In this paper, Yakhou discusses the importance of coordinating the data loop between BIM and evacuation modeling software for fire protection engineering. According to Yakhou, a lack of this integration results in delays, fragmentation, inconsistency, and data loss.

This new tool provides two-way data exchange for evacuation modeling integration into BIM with a digital trail of assets and coupling between design models and analysis results. Yakhou worked closely with Thunderhead Engineering to develop and test this tool for two-way data flow between Revit and Pathfinder. It is hosted on GitHub for all to install and/or contribute as an open source project.

Together, the Revit API and Evac4BIM enable automatic occupant generation in Pathfinder, including pre-movement times and profiles, by importing an IFC file. In the presentation, Yakhou demonstrates this capability which is available today and explores possibilities for future work.