Qualitative methods to explore thermo-spatial perception in outdoor urban spaces

To be able to design thermally comfortable urban spaces, designers require design guidelines that respond to people's thermal and spatial perception. This thermo-spatial perception is influenced by a range of dimensions: the nature and scale of spatial contexts, the kinetic state of the people and the time scale of their perception ('now' or 'the past'). Recently, novel qualitative methods have been developed to link thermal and spatial information of people's perception. To attain an overview of these methods we conducted an extensive literature review. The results show that these qualitative methods respond to the different dimensions by combinations of momentary and long-term thermal perception research in stationary mode and in motion in varying spatial environments. These qualitative methods deliver explicit combination of thermal and spatial information. Based on that evidence, new knowledge relevant to urban design of thermally comfortable urban spaces can be generated

Strengthening the Social Sustainability of Super-Blocks: Belgrade's Emerging Urban Hubs

Focusing on the social aspect of sustainability, this article provides insight into the process of spatial and functional reconsideration of open public spaces in two selected super-blocks in Belgrade, Serbia. Although their spatial typology is similar, one of them was created during the 1960s in New Belgrade, a new administrative center of the city based on the principles of functionalism, while the other one was built during the 1970s, as a part of urban reconstruction conducted in the central areas of Belgrade (Vračar municipality). The beginning of the 21st century has brought new challenges to open public spaces, reflecting the post-transitional changes of the Serbian socio-economic context, as well as the contemporary urban needs of inhabitants. Consequently, both blocks have developed new gathering places for their local communities, although applying two different approaches, spontaneous/informal (New Belgrade) and formal (Vračar). Considering the specificities of both initiatives and the relationship between local communities and the open public spaces of super-blocks, the comparative analysis is conducted in order to identify the occurring social, spatial, and functional modifications, and the achieved level of social sustainability

Research on Building Layout Driven by Energy Flow in Humid Tropics: Take the living space of HALE KUAHINE Dormitory in Honolulu as a thermal comfort simulating object

Building, which can be defined as a “container of life”, should not only be analyzed for expressing visual beauty of architectural language, but special attention related to living quality indoor and outdoor also must be asserted. The desire of comfort is usually satisfied by some mechanical equipment with high energy consumption in modern architecture; however, facing the current crisis of environmental pollution and energy shortage, it is urgent to blaze a trail and to find an architectural approach that is energy-efficient to enhance the life quality. As a part of the Shanghai-Hawaii Global Track Project, this doctoral research has been launched in University of Hawaii at Manoa (UHM), by selecting the non-air-conditioned dormitories in East-West Center (EWC) as an object to study the relation between the comfort level of daily activities and the building programming, which is one of the main architectural design contents once linked too much to spatial accessibility but lacking of considerations from a performance perspective. In order to find appropriate strategies for building programming in such a climate of humid tropics, the paper will blend the lessons of architectural history with the future-oriented technological progress, presenting in two major research clues ---- one is “experience” and the other is “evidence”. Specifically, the clue of “experience” will commence in studying the ancient ingenious ideas from typical human dwellings and vernacular settlements in hot-humid areas and then move to those salient modern regional explorations sparked by their ancestors’ wisdom. Meanwhile, the clue of “evidence” will serve as an evaluation system to demonstrate the feasibility of certain sustainable design concepts, with the assistance of computational simulation data and new credible discoveries from relevant disciplines such as environmental psychology, thermodynamics, neuroscience and behavioral economics on man-environment interaction. By mixing these expertise, architects can take the role of traditional engineers to fabricate a well-tempered “living machine” and figure out some constructive design techniques, which, if applied to mold the campus dormitory, would create a sense of well-being and encourage more students to enjoy the space for a longer time

Designing atmospheres : research and design for thermal comfort in Dutch urban squares

Onderzoek naar de inrichting en verblijfskwaliteit van stadspleinen. Het onderzoek omvat een empirisch gedeelte waarin metingen en interviews op Nederlandse stadspleinen zijn verricht. Daarnaast bevat de studie een ‘ontwerpend onderzoek’ . Dit hield in dat verschillende alternatieven voor een optimaler microklimaat zijn ontworpen en deze met microklimaatsimulaties zijn getest. De resultaten van dit onderzoek vormen gemakkelijk toepasbare ontwerprichtlijnen die ook door de ontwerpers van Nederlandse stadspleinen gebruikt kunnen worden.

Quantitative Methods of Urban Morphology in Urban Design and Environmental Psychology

[EN] Urban morphology investigates the physical form of the city and the historical processes behind its formation. Together with the qualitative analysis, the founding fathers of urban morphology also proposed quantitative measures of urban form. Urban morphologists have traditionally resisted computer-based geoprocessing of urban form and their calculations were mainly carried out manually. Thanks to technological developments, the number of quantitative studies in urban morphology has increased and fully integrated geoprocessing. More sophisticated computer-aided analyses enhance the potential applications in urban design and in environmental psychology research. Space Syntax (Hillier 1998) and Multiple Centrality Assessment (Porta et al. 2006) are configurational, multi-scale approaches to the analysis of the urban street networks, but miss the interplay between streets, building and parcels composing urban fabric. Space Matrix (Berghauser Pont and Haupt 2010) and, more recently, Multiple Fabric Assessment (Araldi and Fusco 2017) are geoprocessing quantitative approaches to the analysis of urban fabric morphology. This study has two aims; (1) classify quantitative urban morphology methods and (2) discuss how these methods could be applied in urban design and environmental psychology. First, we will present the evolution of these methods along with the theories in urban morphology from qualitative to quantitative approaches. Then, we will discuss how these methods could be combined and used in two related areas: urban design and environmental psychology.Erin, I.; Fusco, G.; Cubukcu, E.; Araldi, A. (2018). Quantitative Methods of Urban Morphology in Urban Design and Environmental Psychology. En 24th ISUF International Conference. Book of Papers. Editorial Universitat Politècnica de València. 1391-1400. https://doi.org/10.4995/ISUF2017.2017.5732OCS1391140

Review on Gaps and Challenges in Prediction Outdoor Thermal Comfort Indices: Leveraging Industry 4.0 and ‘Knowledge Translation’

The current outdoor thermal comfort index assessment is either based on thermal sensation votes collected through field surveys/questionnaires or using equations fundamentally backed by thermodynamics, such as the widely used UTCI and PET indices. The predictive ability of all methods suffers from discrepancies as multi-sensory attributes, cultural, emotional, and psychological cognition factors are ignored. These factors are proven to influence the thermal sensation and duration people spend outdoors, and are equally prominent factors as air temperature, solar radiation, and relative humidity. The studies that adopted machine learning models, such as Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs), concentrated on improving the predictive capability of PET, thereby making the field of Artificial Intelligence (AI) domain underexplored. Furthermore, universally adopted outdoor thermal comfort indices under-predict a neutral thermal range, for a reason that is linked to the fact that all indices were validated on European/American subjects living in temperate, cold regions. The review highlighted gaps and challenges in outdoor thermal comfort prediction accuracy by comparing traditional methods and Industry 4.0. Additionally, a further recommendation to improve prediction accuracy by exploiting Industry 4.0 (machine learning, artificial reality, brain–computer interface, geo-spatial digital twin) is examined through Knowledge Translatio

Space Design for Thermal Comfort and Energy Efficiency in Summer

Passive cooling for thermal comfort in summer is a big issue in low-energy building design. An important reason is global warming because global warming increases the number of cooling degree days. In addition, the energy demand of buildings has increased rapidly due to both the improvement of living standards and the globalisation of modern architecture. And finally, cooling a building is especially a challenge in countries where few resources are available. Passive cooling techniques, where solar and heating control systems are applied, largely depend on the design of the urban morphology and the building shape. The first research question is therefore: What is the relationship between spatial configuration, thermal environment and thermal summer comfort of occupants and how to apply spatial configuration as the passive cooling strategy in architectural design? Space is the empty part of a building, but its volume is important for the activities of occupants. Architects define the general spatial structure of a building mainly in the early design stages. There they define the spatial properties of a building, i.e. how the spaces are connected and what are the boundary conditions between the spaces. The final research question of this research therefore is: What is the relationship between spatial configuration, thermal environment and thermal summer comfort and how to apply spatial configuration as passive cooling strategy in architectural design in the early stages? In order to answer this research question, this dissertation is divided into two main parts. Part I is the theoretical research phase. The goal is to clarify the relationship between spatial configuration of buildings, the thermal environment and thermal comfort of occupants in summer. In this part, a literature review of the fundamental theoretical background knowledge of thermal comfort and passive cooling technology is summarised. As the author got his inspiration from Chinese vernacular architecture, the second step was conducting surveys and performing analyses of the spatial design, thermal environment and thermal summer comfort in Chinese vernacular buildings. Contemporary residential buildings were also investigated. A challenge was to find examples of contemporary buildings with appropriate spatial designs and thermal comfort as well as contemporary buildings with less successful spatial designs and thermal comfort. The third step was to find correlations between the occupants’ spatial and thermal perception through questionnaires. Questionnaires were held among Chinese as well as Dutch architecture students. The main research outcome of part I is the definition of “building microclimate”. Building microclimate is defined as “a type of microclimate which involves indoor spaces and spaces surrounding the indoor spaces in a particular building”. It is not just the microclimate around the building; it also includes the indoor climate. A suitable building microclimate is important for the occupants’ thermal comfort in summer. Another research outcome of part I is the revelation of the relationship between spatial perception and adaptive thermal comfort. Combining the relationship between spatial perception and adaptive thermal comfort with the new definition of building microclimate leads to the conclusion that the spatial configuration of a building plays an important role in creating a particular building microclimate. Part II is a practical research phase. The goal is to explore the possibility of using a spatial design method as a passive cooling strategy for thermal summer comfort and to demonstrate how to apply this method in the early design stages. As a first step, the potential of using a space analysis method for passive cooling and thermal comfort was investigated. A convex spatial analysis method was developed from the traditional space syntax method to analyse the natural ventilation potential. Both the logical relationship between the spaces and the boundary conditions between the spaces can influence the accessibility of a particular spatial configuration, and thus influence the potential for natural ventilation. The convex space analysis method is chosen for the preliminary analysis to show the logical relationships between spaces. It cannot completely predict natural ventilation, but it is a graphical method that is easy to use. Architects conceive design solutions generally through graphic methods, making the convex space analysis a good design tool. The extended visibility graph analysis (VGA) method is the best choice for the natural ventilation potential analysis for a spatial configuration. The isovist measure can be used for the natural ventilation potential of a single space. Two case studies were performed to demonstrate the proposed method for architectural design in the early design stages. The main finding of part II is the potential of using spatial indicators to predict the airflow performance of buildings. New applications of the developed space syntax methods are proposed to help architects in designing a contemporary building that is thermally more comfortable and that has a lower energy demand for cooling. This research is performed at the cross disciplines of architectural spatial design, passive cooling and thermal comfort. This research proposes several ideas for the first time. The term “building microclimate’ is one. The application of a spatial design parameter for thermal comfort is another. This research can contribute to the sustainable development of buildings, Chinese ones in particular. It can help design residential buildings for occupants with low and medium incomes by decreasing the necessity of air conditioning and improving the living environment for thermal comfort as well. This research is also valuable for passive or zero-energy design of houses in the Netherlands and the Mediterranean area. This research will enrich the green building science by introducing enhanced space syntax methods for adaptive thermal comfort and for passive cooling by means of spatial design. This thesis is mainly composed of a collection of the author’s published papers

Space Design for Thermal Comfort and Energy Efficiency in Summer:

Passive cooling for thermal comfort in summer is a big issue in low-energy building design. An important reason is global warming because global warming increases the number of cooling degree days. In addition, the energy demand of buildings has increased rapidly due to both the improvement of living standards and the globalisation of modern architecture. And finally, cooling a building is especially a challenge in countries where few resources are available. Passive cooling techniques, where solar and heating control systems are applied, largely depend on the design of the urban morphology and the building shape. The first research question is therefore: What is the relationship between spatial configuration, thermal environment and thermal summer comfort of occupants and how to apply spatial configuration as the passive cooling strategy in architectural design? Space is the empty part of a building, but its volume is important for the activities of occupants. Architects define the general spatial structure of a building mainly in the early design stages. There they define the spatial properties of a building, i.e. how the spaces are connected and what are the boundary conditions between the spaces. The final research question of this research therefore is: What is the relationship between spatial configuration, thermal environment and thermal summer comfort and how to apply spatial configuration as passive cooling strategy in architectural design in the early stages? In order to answer this research question, this dissertation is divided into two main parts. Part I is the theoretical research phase. The goal is to clarify the relationship between spatial configuration of buildings, the thermal environment and thermal comfort of occupants in summer. In this part, a literature review of the fundamental theoretical background knowledge of thermal comfort and passive cooling technology is summarised. As the author got his inspiration from Chinese vernacular architecture, the second step was conducting surveys and performing analyses of the spatial design, thermal environment and thermal summer comfort in Chinese vernacular buildings. Contemporary residential buildings were also investigated. A challenge was to find examples of contemporary buildings with appropriate spatial designs and thermal comfort as well as contemporary buildings with less successful spatial designs and thermal comfort. The third step was to find correlations between the occupants’ spatial and thermal perception through questionnaires. Questionnaires were held among Chinese as well as Dutch architecture students. The main research outcome of part I is the definition of “building microclimate”. Building microclimate is defined as “a type of microclimate which involves indoor spaces and spaces surrounding the indoor spaces in a particular building”. It is not just the microclimate around the building; it also includes the indoor climate. A suitable building microclimate is important for the occupants’ thermal comfort in summer. Another research outcome of part I is the revelation of the relationship between spatial perception and adaptive thermal comfort. Combining the relationship between spatial perception and adaptive thermal comfort with the new definition of building microclimate leads to the conclusion that the spatial configuration of a building plays an important role in creating a particular building microclimate. Part II is a practical research phase. The goal is to explore the possibility of using a spatial design method as a passive cooling strategy for thermal summer comfort and to demonstrate how to apply this method in the early design stages. As a first step, the potential of using a space analysis method for passive cooling and thermal comfort was investigated. A convex spatial analysis method was developed from the traditional space syntax method to analyse the natural ventilation potential. Both the logical relationship between the spaces and the boundary conditions between the spaces can influence the accessibility of a particular spatial configuration, and thus influence the potential for natural ventilation. The convex space analysis method is chosen for the preliminary analysis to show the logical relationships between spaces. It cannot completely predict natural ventilation, but it is a graphical method that is easy to use. Architects conceive design solutions generally through graphic methods, making the convex space analysis a good design tool. The extended visibility graph analysis (VGA) method is the best choice for the natural ventilation potential analysis for a spatial configuration. The isovist measure can be used for the natural ventilation potential of a single space. Two case studies were performed to demonstrate the proposed method for architectural design in the early design stages. The main finding of part II is the potential of using spatial indicators to predict the airflow performance of buildings. New applications of the developed space syntax methods are proposed to help architects in designing a contemporary building that is thermally more comfortable and that has a lower energy demand for cooling. This research is performed at the cross disciplines of architectural spatial design, passive cooling and thermal comfort. This research proposes several ideas for the first time. The term “building microclimate’ is one. The application of a spatial design parameter for thermal comfort is another. This research can contribute to the sustainable development of buildings, Chinese ones in particular. It can help design residential buildings for occupants with low and medium incomes by decreasing the necessity of air conditioning and improving the living environment for thermal comfort as well. This research is also valuable for passive or zero-energy design of houses in the Netherlands and the Mediterranean area. This research will enrich the green building science by introducing enhanced space syntax methods for adaptive thermal comfort and for passive cooling by means of spatial design. This thesis is mainly composed of a collection of the author’s published papers

Fuzzy cognitive mapping to support multi-agent decisions in development of urban policymaking

The awareness about environmental complexity involves real-time knowledge and demands urban planning initiatives. Knowledge is multiform, multi-agent and mirrors environmental complexity. Problems characterizing urban sustainability particularly claim non-expert knowledge, being informal, puzzling, uncertain, incomplete, hard to be handled, formalized, modelled. This study utilizes Fuzzy cognitive maps to explore such complexity and support multiagent decisions. It concerns the scenario-building process of the new plan of Taranto (Italy), a paradigmatic example of decaying industrial area, heavily characterized by social fragmentation and environment degradation. This approach aims at structuring environmental problems, modelling future strategies and contributing to build a multi-agent decision support system for complex urban planning contexts

The Application of Space Syntax to Enhance Sociability in Public Urban Spaces: A Systematic Review

Public urban spaces are vital settings for fostering social interaction among people. However, understanding how spatial layouts can promote positive social behaviors remains a critical and debated challenge for urban designers and planners aiming to create socially sustainable environments. Space syntax, a well-established theory and research method, explores the influence of spatial configurations on social aspects. Despite its significant contributions, there is a lack of comprehensive systematic reviews evaluating its effectiveness in enhancing social interaction within urban public spaces. This study aims to identify the existing scientific gaps in the domain of space syntax studies, with a primary focus on sociability in public urban spaces. Following the PRISMA framework, a thorough literature search was conducted in the Scopus database, yielding 1107 relevant articles. After applying screening and eligibility criteria, 26 articles were selected for in-depth review. This review adopted a novel approach to synthesizing and analyzing the findings for identifying underexplored scientific gaps. The findings suggested a wide variety of research gaps to address, encompassing evidence, knowledge, practical, methodological, empirical, theoretical, and target populations to provide a thorough overview of the current state of knowledge in this field. In conclusion, by exploring the interplay between space syntax and design elements such as the urban infrastructure, landscaping, and microclimate in these areas, future research can bridge this gap, particularly when considering a cross-cultural lens. This study underscores the importance of space syntax in promoting social interaction in urban public spaces, offering a robust foundation for future research and practical applications to create more socially engaging environments