Improving Natural Ventilation Performance in a High-Density Urban District: A Building Morphology Method

Abstract

The urban expansion of Dalian city by a high-density downtown morphological pattern cause the wind speed per year trended downward. Therefore improving urban ventilation performance is becoming more important for urban planners. To evaluate natural ventilation performance in the high-density downtown area of Dalian, an in situ wind environmental survey was conducted. The natural ventilation performance of different building morphologies was further evaluated via CFD simulations tools PHOENICS 2012. The results indicate that urban edifices, such as enclosed city blocks, strip apartments in rows, high-rise buildings with large podium bulk, are unfavorable to natural ventilation, and strategies as using ventilation channels and increasing building height while decreasing their land coverage could improve the urban ventilation performance. The quantitative relevance between building morphology and wind environment is examined, according to the result of which an ameliorate morphology proposal is presented and assessed by PHOENICS 2012. This research could provide a method to create a livable urban wind environment.