A review on the study of urban wind at the pedestrian level around buildings

Urbanization is leading towards the change of local wind climate in the vicinity of tall buildings, which influences the pedestrian level wind environment to an uncomfortable or even dangerous level. Therefore nowadays, building design should not be limited only for the consideration of wind load and indoor environment, but outdoor wind environment should also be considered. This study presents a review of the methods for the assessment of pedestrian level wind climate, different wind comfort criterion and various techniques to evaluate the wind speed at the pedestrian level. In later sections, brief review for the influence of different parameters related to building design and configuration on pedestrian level wind is presented. After analyzing previous literature it is suggested that there is a strong need for the homogenization of different wind comfort criterion, as it may lead to different consequences for the architects. Among various wind tunnel measurement techniques, use of Irwin probe is simple and accurate compared to hot-wire anemometry and it can be installed at numerous locations for simultaneous measurement of pedestrian level wind speed. For numerical simulation, Reynolds Averaged Navier Stokes based technique has been used by various researchers, although this technique is not accurate as much as large eddy simulation and detached eddy simulation. But this technique is cost effective and requires less computing resources.