Abstract
Rapid urban expansion leads to the continuous deterioration of the urban thermal environment, which endangers the sustainable development of the city; meanwhile, countries all over the world are becoming increasingly interested in the mitigating effects of urban green spaces on heat islands. In this context, many studies show that pocket parks play an important role in optimizing the thermal environment of urban blocks, especially with the high-intensity development of urban blocks. Moreover, many cities in China have become mature, and it is difficult to open up large green areas. Therefore, to improve the urban thermal environment in summer, it is necessary to adapt to an efficient pocket-park design strategy in blocks. To consider the impact of block development intensity on the design strategy of pocket parks, three pocket parks in blocks with different floor-area ratios in the central area of Xi’an were selected as examples. This research compares the effects of tree density and green-space layout on the thermal environment in different floor-area ratio districts on a summer day using environmental simulation (ENVI-met). The results show that the design strategies of pocket parks in urban blocks with different development intensities are different. High tree density performs better from the perspective of improving the urban thermal environment. For the low and medium development intensity blocks, the effects of the open green space and closed green space are similar, while the open green space layout can significantly improve thermal comfort in high-intensity development blocks.
Highlights
Most cities in China have basically completed the construction of urban patterns, but a series of environmental problems have emerged in this process
An optimal design method for pocket parks in di ferent districts should be proposed by selecting the tree density and spatial layout
We demonstrated that the higher the tree density, the greater the cooling effect is on the surrounding thermal environment
Summary
Most cities in China have basically completed the construction of urban patterns, but a series of environmental problems have emerged in this process. The most prominent problem is that urban high-density development directly leads to the deterioration of the urban thermal environment [1]. The urban heat island (UHI) is one of the typical characteristics of urban climate. It is a phenomenon wherein the temperature in the city is higher than that in the suburbs. The reinforced concrete, brick and tile, asphalt pavement, and buildings involved in urban construction cause the city to store more heat from the sun [2,3]. After 2000, the UHI of Xi’an entered a relatively strong period
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