VISUALIZING PEDESTRIAN COMFORT USING ENVI-MET

Abstract

One of the environmental consequences of rapidly growing urban areas such as Phoenix, Arizona, is its negative impact to the outdoor environment. On the pedestrian micro-scale, the effects are difficult to visualize. Design decisions such as street and sidewalk widths, shading structures, materials, landscaping, building heights, and air flow have a significant impact on the pedestrian thermal comfort and subsequently on the use of the urban environment. This paper discusses visualization of human thermal comfort on the micro-scale, using various mitigating strategies that can create a more thermally comfortable pedestrian environment in downtown Phoenix.