Potential of Urban Densification to Mitigate the Effects of Heat Island in Vienna, Austria

Abstract

Global increase of urban population has brought about a growing demand for more dwelling space, resulting in various negative impacts, such as accelerated urbanization, urban sprawl and higher carbon footprints. To cope with these growth dynamics, city authorities are urged to consider alternative planning strategies aiming at mitigating the negative implications of urbanization. In this context, the present contribution investigates the potential of urban densification to mitigate the heat island effects and to improve outdoor thermal conditions. Focusing on a quite densely urbanized district in Vienna, Austria, we carried out a set of simulations of urban microclimate for pre- and post-densification scenarios using the parametric modelling environment Rhinoceros 3D and a set of built-in algorithms in the Rhino’s plug-in Grasshopper. The study was conducted for a hot summer period. The results revealed a notable solar shielding effect of newly introduced vertical extensions of existing buildings, promoting temperature decrease and improved thermal conditions within more shaded urban canyons and courtyards. However, a slight warming effect was noted during the night-time due to the higher thermal storage and lower sky view factor.

Urban transformation and heat island: Potential of urban design alternatives to mitigate the effects of urban overheating in Austrian cities

“…In principle, Honeybee connects the Grasshopper with validated simulation engines, such as EnergyPlus (EnergyPlus, 2019), Radiance (Radiance, 2019), THERM -Two-Dimensional Building Heat-Transfer Modeling (Therm, 2019), in order to perform advanced energy and daylight simulations, including the envelope heat flow. More details about the specific settings and operative steps involved in undertaken energy simulations may be found in Vuckovic et al, (2019).…”

Monitoring Urban Expansion Using Remote-Sensing Data Aided by Google Earth Engine

“…Urbanization is accompanied by rapid social and economic development, while the process of urbanization causes the degradation of the natural ecology. Many environmental problems have been demonstrated in the developed regions, such as change in land use type , loss of biodiversity (Knapp et al, 2018;Križnik, 2018), deterioration of air quality (Lewis, 2018), increased heat island effect (Herath et al, 2018;Kaplan, 2019;Vuckovic et al, 2019), air www.euraass.com pollution (Mayer, 1999;Kampa and Castanas, 2008;Hou et al, 2019) and so on. Under this condition, the structure and function of the urban ecosystem have been destroyed, which seriously threatens the urban ecological and environmental security (Li et al, 2019).…”

A Spatiotemporal Analysis of Urban Densification in an Organically Growing Urban Area

“…Treija, Bratuškins, and Koroļova (2018) considered it as an infill development approach in a large housing area. Vuckovic et al (2019) see it as heat island mitigation for the improvement of outdoor thermal conditions where it was argued that vertical extensions of existing buildings provided solar shielding. Urban densification may be protective against obesity risk but may have adverse effects on blood lipids and blood pressure (Chandrabose et al, 2019).…”

“…In contrast, urban densification has negative impact on housing demand and land use (Wolff et al, 2017). In terms of temperature, it contributes to urban heat islands (Duan et al, 2019;Vuckovic et al, 2019) which should be discouraged in a hot and humid climate (Lima et al, 2019;Ribault et al, 2017). Considering urban open and green spaces, urban densification has contributed to potential changes in green space infrastructure (Lin et al, 2015;Ståhle, 2008;Vergnes et al, 2014).…”