Urban Informatics

Urban Informatics
Author: Wenzhong Shi
Publisher: Springer Nature
Total Pages: 941
Release: 2021-04-06
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 9811589836

This open access book is the first to systematically introduce the principles of urban informatics and its application to every aspect of the city that involves its functioning, control, management, and future planning. It introduces new models and tools being developed to understand and implement these technologies that enable cities to function more efficiently – to become ‘smart’ and ‘sustainable’. The smart city has quickly emerged as computers have become ever smaller to the point where they can be embedded into the very fabric of the city, as well as being central to new ways in which the population can communicate and act. When cities are wired in this way, they have the potential to become sentient and responsive, generating massive streams of ‘big’ data in real time as well as providing immense opportunities for extracting new forms of urban data through crowdsourcing. This book offers a comprehensive review of the methods that form the core of urban informatics from various kinds of urban remote sensing to new approaches to machine learning and statistical modelling. It provides a detailed technical introduction to the wide array of tools information scientists need to develop the key urban analytics that are fundamental to learning about the smart city, and it outlines ways in which these tools can be used to inform design and policy so that cities can become more efficient with a greater concern for environment and equity.

Urban Informatics and Future Cities

Urban Informatics and Future Cities
Author: S. C. M. Geertman
Publisher: Springer Nature
Total Pages: 632
Release: 2021-07-15
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 3030760596

This book forms a selection of chapters submitted for the CUPUM (Computational Urban Planning and Urban Management) conference, held in the second week of June 2021 at Aalto University in Helsinki, Finland. Chapters were selected from a double-blind review process by the conference's scientific committee. The chapters in the book cover developments and applications with big data and urban analytics, collaborative urban planning, applications of geodesign and innovations, and planning support science.

Urban Meteorology

Urban Meteorology
Author: National Research Council
Publisher: National Academies Press
Total Pages: 190
Release: 2012-06-13
Genre: Science
ISBN: 0309252202

According to the United Nations, three out of five people will be living in cities worldwide by the year 2030. The United States continues to experience urbanization with its vast urban corridors on the east and west coasts. Although urban weather is driven by large synoptic and meso-scale features, weather events unique to the urban environment arise from the characteristics of the typical urban setting, such as large areas covered by buildings of a variety of heights; paved streets and parking areas; means to supply electricity, natural gas, water, and raw materials; and generation of waste heat and materials. Urban Meteorology: Forecasting, Monitoring, and Meeting Users' Needs is based largely on the information provided at a Board on Atmospheric Sciences and Climate community workshop. This book describes the needs for end user communities, focusing in particular on needs that are not being met by current urban-level forecasting and monitoring. Urban Meteorology also describes current and emerging meteorological forecasting and monitoring capabilities that have had and will likely have the most impact on urban areas, some of which are not being utilized by the relevant end user communities. Urban Meteorology explains that users of urban meteorological information need high-quality information available in a wide variety of formats that foster its use and within time constraints set by users' decision processes. By advancing the science and technology related to urban meteorology with input from key end user communities, urban meteorologists can better meet the needs of diverse end users. To continue the advancement within the field of urban meteorology, there are both short-term needs-which might be addressed with small investments but promise large, quick returns-as well as future challenges that could require significant efforts and investments.

From Social Butterfly to Engaged Citizen

From Social Butterfly to Engaged Citizen
Author: Marcus Foth
Publisher: MIT Press
Total Pages: 541
Release: 2011-11-18
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0262297558

Studies from around the world show how the social media tools of Web 2.0 are shaping engagement with cities, communities, and spaces. Web 2.0 tools, including blogs, wikis, and photo sharing and social networking sites, have made possible a more participatory Internet experience. Much of this technology is available for mobile phones, where it can be integrated with such device-specific features as sensors and GPS. From Social Butterfly to Engaged Citizen examines how this increasingly open, collaborative, and personalizable technology is shaping not just our social interactions but new kinds of civic engagement with cities, communities, and spaces. It offers analyses and studies from around the world that explore how the power of social technologies can be harnessed for social engagement in urban areas. Chapters by leading researchers in the emerging field of urban informatics outline the theoretical context of their inquiries, describing a new view of the city as a hybrid that merges digital and physical worlds; examine technology-aided engagement involving issues of food, the environment, and sustainability; explore the creative use of location-based mobile technology in cities from Melbourne, Australia, to Dhaka, Bangladesh; study technological innovations for improving civic engagement; and discuss design research approaches for understanding the development of sentient real-time cities, including interaction portals and robots.

The Urban Heat Island

The Urban Heat Island
Author: Iain D. Stewart
Publisher: Elsevier
Total Pages: 184
Release: 2021-05-25
Genre: Science
ISBN: 0128156902

The Urban Heat Island (UHI) is an area of growing interest for many people studying the urban environment and local/global climate change. The UHI has been scientifically studied for 200 years and, although it is an apparently simple phenomenon, there is considerable confusion around the different types of UHI and their assessment. The Urban Heat Island—A Guidebook provides simple instructions for measuring and analysing the phenomenon, as well as greater context for defining the UHI and the impacts it can have. Readers will be empowered to work within a set of guidelines that enable direct comparison of UHI effects across diverse settings, while informing a wide range of climate mitigation and adaptation programs to modify human behaviour and the built form. This opens the door to true global assessments of local climate change in cities. Urban planning and design strategies can then be evaluated for their effectiveness at mitigating these changes. - Covers both on-surface and near-surface, or canopy, measurements and impacts of Urban Heat Islands (UHI) - Provides a set of best practices and guidelines for UHI observation and analysis - Includes both conceptual overviews and practical instructions for a wide range of uses

Urban Heat Stress and Mitigation Solutions

Urban Heat Stress and Mitigation Solutions
Author: Vincenzo Costanzo
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 431
Release: 2021-09-08
Genre: Architecture
ISBN: 1000431509

This book provides the reader with an understanding of the impact that different morphologies, construction materials and green coverage solutions have on the urban microclimate, thus affecting the comfort conditions of urban inhabitants and the energy needs of buildings in urban areas. The book covers the latest approaches to energy and outdoor comfort measurement and modelling on an urban scale, and describes possible measures and strategies to mitigate the effects of the mutual interaction between urban settlements and local microclimate. Despite its relevance, only limited literature is currently devoted to appraising—from an engineering perspective—the intertwining relationships between urban geometry and fabrics, energy fluxes between buildings and their surroundings, outdoor microclimate conditions and building energy demands in urban areas. This book fills this gap by first discussing the physical processes that govern heat and mass transfer at an urban scale, while emphasizing the role played by different spatial arrangements, manmade materials and green infrastructures on the outdoor microclimate. The first chapters also address the implications of these factors on the outdoor comfort conditions experienced by pedestrians, and on the buildings’ energy demand for space heating and cooling. Then, based upon cutting-edge experimental activities and simulation work, this book demonstrates current and forthcoming adaptation and mitigation strategies to improve the urban microclimate and its impact on the built environment, such as cool materials, thermochromic and retroreflective finishing materials, and green infrastructures applied either at a building scale or at the urban scale. The effect of these solutions is demonstrated for different cities worldwide under a range of climate conditions. Finally, the book opens a wider perspective by introducing the basic elements that allow fuel poverty, raw materials consumption, and the principles of circular economy in the definition of a resilient urban settlement.

Urban Climate Adaptation and Mitigation

Urban Climate Adaptation and Mitigation
Author: Ayyoob Sharifi
Publisher: Elsevier
Total Pages: 378
Release: 2022-09-16
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0323855539

Uniquely focused on the contributions smart cities can make to climate change resilience, Urban Climate Adaptation and Mitigation offers evidence-based scientific solutions for improving cities' abilities to prepare for, recover from, and adapt to global climate-related events. Beginning with the observation of global environmental change, this book explores what sustainable smart projects are, how they are adopted and evaluated, and how they can address climate change challenges. It brings together a wide variety of disciplines such as planning, transportation, and waste management to address issues related to climate change adaptation and mitigation in cities.In general, many social science researchers lack cohesive, broad-based literature knowledge; Urban Climate Adaptation and Mitigation bridges this gap and informs different types of stakeholders on how they can enhance their preparation abilities to enable real-time responses and actions. Therefore, it is a valuable reference for researchers, professors, graduate students, city planners, and policy makers. Application-focused throughout, this book explores the complexities of urban systems and subsystems to support researchers, planners, and decision makers in their efforts toward developing more climate-resilient smart cities. - Provides a structured in-depth analysis of smart city cases from around the world - Introduces evidence-based toolkits and frameworks for assessing actual and/or potential contributions of smart city solutions to climate resilience - Includes state-of-the-art literature review and glossary

Advances and New Trends in Environmental Informatics

Advances and New Trends in Environmental Informatics
Author: Andreas Kamilaris
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 270
Release: 2021-12-18
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 9783030619718

This book is an outcome of the 34th International Conference EnviroInfo 2020, hosted virtually in Nicosia, Cyprus by the Research Centre on Interactive Media, Smart Systems and Emerging Technologies (RISE). It presents a selection of papers that describe innovative scientific approaches and ongoing research in environmental informatics and the emerging field of environmental sustainability, promoted and facilitated by the use of information and communication technologies (ICT). The respective articles cover a broad range of scientific aspects including advances in core environmental informatics-related technologies such as earth observation, environmental modelling, big data and machine learning, robotics, smart agriculture and food solutions, renewable energy-based solutions, optimization of infrastructures, sustainable industrial processes, and citizen science, as well as applications of ICT solutions intended to support societal transformation processes toward the more sustainable management of resource use, transportation and energy supplies. Given its scope, the book is essential reading for scientists, experts and students in these fields of research. Chapter “Developing a Configuration System for a Simulation Game in the Domain of Urban CO2 Emissions Reduction” is available open access under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License via link.springer.com.

Urban Climate Mitigation Techniques

Urban Climate Mitigation Techniques
Author: Mat Santamouris
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 223
Release: 2016-01-08
Genre: Architecture
ISBN: 1317658639

The urban climate is continuously deteriorating. Urban heat lowers the quality of urban life, increases energy needs, and affects the urban socio-economy. Urban Climate Mitigation Techniques presents steps that can be taken to mitigate this situation through a series of innovative technologies and examples of best practices for the improvement of the urban climate. Including tools for evaluation and a comparative analysis, this book addresses anthropogenic heat, green areas, cool materials and pavements, outdoor shading structures, evaporative cooling and earth cooling. Case studies demonstrate the success and applicability of these measures in various cities throughout the world. Useful for urban designers, architects and planners, Urban Climate Mitigation Techniques is a step by step tour of the innovative technologies improving our urban climate, providing a holistic approach supported by well-established quantitative examples.