Optimization of Street Aspect Ratio for Pedestrian Comfort in Hot and Humid Climate of Nepal
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I.O.E. Pulchowk Campus
Abstract
Walkable and livable cities come under the first priority of people searching for a new
residential space in today’s context. In order to create a comfortable walkable condition
for pedestrians, more focus should be given to shading the pathway. Among many
ideas, the development of an optimum aspect ratio is paramount for improving the
walkability of any street. This research is focused on developing and promoting an
optimum street aspect ratio in the hot and humid road section of Lumbini Sanskritik
Municipality through the use of Envi-Met software. This research involves the use of
temperature and humidity data to simulate 3D street layouts in order to obtain the
desired results in the form of air temperature, mean radiant temperature and
physiological equivalent temperature as outputs. This research concludes that for east-
west oriented streets, the aspect ratio above 2 is favorable whereas for north-south
oriented streets, the aspect ratio of 1.5 is the optimum result. The optimum aspect ratio
obtained from the simulation reduced the ambient air temperature of the same street by
more than 3.5 °C, mean radiant temperature by more than 20 °C and physiological
equivalent temperature by more than 12 °C. Similarly, orientation from 30° NE/210°
SW to 150 ° NW/330° SE seems better for street orientation in case of Lumbini
Description
Walkable and livable cities come under the first priority of people searching for a new
residential space in today’s context. In order to create a comfortable walkable condition
for pedestrians, more focus should be given to shading the pathway.