Evaluation of the impact of urban fabric typo-morphology component on thermal comfort in open public spaces in neighborhood scale (Case study: the historical part of region 3, Isfahan)

Increased temperatures in urban areas due to high energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions are some of the problems of today's cities.Urban open spaces in hot and arid climates experience this problem more in summer.The purpose of this study is to show the relationship between morphological components of the urban fabric and thermal comfort through integrated analysis.In this study, urban fabric types were extracted by considering ground space index, floor space index, open space ratio, average height, streets orientation, streets organization, and type of plots according to their configuration of mass and space.To study thermal comfort, a field study was carried out in five neighborhoods in the historical context, for five continuous days in summer.Environmental variables including air temperature, humidity, radiant temperature, and wind speed were measured, and the physiological equivalent temperature index was calculated using ENVI-met software; thermal comfort in the neighborhoods with different morphological characteristics was analyzed.The results showed that more than half of the data during the day in the hot season in all five neighborhoods are in conditions of extreme heat stress.Comparison of neighborhoods with different morphological features indicated that two neighborhoods with higher open space ratios, despite the difference in the orientation of the streets and the type of plots, have lower thermal comfort compared to other types.A neighborhood with a higher ground space index and a lower open space ratio has a lower average physiological equivalent temperature.