Browsing by Author "Jayasooriya, V"

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item: Conference-Full-text
Cycling routes to mitigate heat stress on cyclists in tropical urban environments: an extendable agent-based modeling framework for strategic decision-making and business applications
(Business Research Unit (BRU), 2024) Waidyalankara, SAR; Dassanayake, SM; Jayasooriya, V
Heat stress is a significant concern for cyclists in tropical urban environments, impacting both their well-being and overall thermal comfort. While extensive research has been conducted globally to mitigate heat stress, particularly in cold climate cities where winter heat stress reduces urban thermal comfort, the focus has largely been on pedestrian thermal comfort. Research on addressing heat stress among cyclists, especially in tropical urban settings, remains limited. The optimization of cycling routes to minimize perceived heat stress and improve thermal comfort is an area that has not been extensively explored. This study addresses these research gaps by introducing a novel and effective methodology utilizing an Agent-Based Model to assist urban cyclists in selecting routes that minimize heat stress. By doing so, the study aims to enhance the thermal comfort of cyclists in tropical cities, contributing to a more sustainable and cyclist-friendly urban environment.
item: Conference-Full-text
A study on pedestrian pavement thermal performance with reference to associated materials
(IEEE, 2021-07) Senevirathne, D; Jayasooriya, V; Muthukumaran, S; Adhikariwatte, W; Rathnayake, M; Hemachandra, K
The urban environment is continuously expanding and the majority of the green spaces in urban areas are replaced by various grey infrastructure such as buildings, roads, and pavements. Improper planning of infrastructure exacerbates negative impacts on urban microclimates that leads to an increase in average annual air temperatures by 1°C to 3°C, demonstrating an effect known as Urban Heat Island (UHI). Approximately one-third of the urban land uses are known to be covered with paved surfaces. Therefore, the contribution of pavements to UHI is of a serious concern. The energy performance of grey infrastructure is largely influenced by the materials associated, and the material's street physical properties. Identification of the thermal performance variations of pavers of alternative materials will assist landscape planners to select suitable paver types in an optimal way to reduce UHI, after considering the surrounding structures and the direction of shading. The current study was concentrated on three pavement types representing changes in materials; 1) Cement Pavers (CP), 2) Terracotta Pavers (TP) and 3) Grass Pavers (GP), to assess the thermal performance of pavement designs which are commonly used for urban pavement construction. The study was conducted in an urban environment in Colombo, Sri Lanka by considering three replicates for each material. One-way ANOVA was performed to analyze the significant differences on the thermal performance of different material types. According to the results obtained, both TP and GP showed significant difference to the thermal performance of CP from 9.00 AM to 3.00 PM. Furthermore, between 8.00 AM–3.00 PM there was no significance difference among the performance between GP and TP. However, TP showed the lowest surface temperature levels and heat emittance considering heat levels throughout the day. The maximum temperature difference compared to CP was shown at 1.00 PM as 4.49°C with TP and as 4.42°C with GP. The findings of this study provide valuable insights in integrating commonly used materials in pavement designing for urban areas, in order to regulate microclimates and reduce the impacts of UHI.