May Ecological Corridors at Urban Areas Help the Improvement of Air Quality and Outdoor Thermal Comfort in Winter Cities?

Climate-sensitive urban planning research is crucial for improving city life quality, especially in winter-cities, providing to incorporate climatic elements to planning to promote outdoor activities and improving air quality. This study aims to examine the impact of ecological corridors on outdoor human thermal comfort and air pollution in winter cities. The study assessed how the urban environment in Erzurum, one of Turkey's coldest cities with low thermal comfort and high PM10 levels, responds to changing climatic conditions in regard to the implementation of proposed ecological corridors that involved opening closed stream lines. The winter 2023 analysis assessed the effectiveness of ecological corridors in mitigating winter disturbances caused by air pollution and thermal comfort conditions in the Erzurum, using maps generated from morphological, meteorological, and spatial data employing ENVI-met. It was found that newly established ecological corridors can mitigate the negative effects of high urban density, improper land use, lack of natural and green areas, and ventilation issues, leading to enhanced air quality and temperature. Same corridors, however, may decrease thermal comfort levels by inducing cold stress, especially in shaded areas. Thus, ecological corridors should be implemented with caution considering their potential negative and positive impacts on quality of city life.