Community Twin Ecosystem for Disaster Resilient Communities

This paper presents COWINE (Community Twin Ecosystem), an ecosystem that harnesses Digital Twin (DT) to elevate and transform community resilience strategies. COWINE aims to enhance the disaster resilience of communities by fostering collaborative participation in the use of its DT among the decision-makers, the general public, and other involved stakeholders. COWINE leverages Cities:Skylines as its base simulation engine integrated with real-world data for community DT development. It is capable of capturing the dynamic, intricate, and interconnected structures of communities to provide actionable insights into disaster resilience planning. Through demonstrative, simulation-based case studies on Brevard County, Florida, the paper illustrates COWINE’s collaborative use with the involved parties in managing tornado scenarios. This study demonstrates how COWINE supports the identification of vulnerable areas, the execution of adaptive strategies, and the efficient allocation of resources before, during, and after a disaster. This paper further explores potential research directions using COWINE. The findings show COWINE’s potential to be utilized as a collaborative tool for community disaster resilience management.