Outdoor Human Comfort and Its Assessment: State of the Art

Outdoor Human Comfort and Its Assessment describes the state-of-the-art methods for assessing and improving outdoor human comfort. Factors affecting outdoor comfort are wind, air temperatures, humidity, sun, and precipitation. Wind in particular is greatly affected by large buildings. Many modern developments are wind tunnel tested to examine how the wind flows around new buildings will affect pedestrians. Testing methods and criteria for assessing comfort and safety are discussed. Criteria are expressed in terms of not only threshold wind speeds for discomfort, but also the percentage of time that conditions should be below those thresholds. Wind and its mechanical effects, such as picking up dust, impairing balance, or blowing people over, historically were the factors receiving the most attention. However, in more recent years, methods for including other factors, such as solar radiation, air temperature, and humidity, have been developed. Contents include: elements of the microclimate; methods of determining wind conditions; wind criteria and control measures; and assessing thermal comfort.