TITLE:
An Evaluation of Measures Regarding Road Traffic against the Urban Heat Island in the Tokyo Ward Area, Japan
AUTHORS:
Kohei Imai, Kayoko Yamamoto
KEYWORDS:
Urban Heat Island (UHI), Road Traffic, Artificial Exhaust Heat, UHI-Related Policy, GIS
JOURNAL NAME:
Journal of Environmental Protection,
Vol.6 No.9,
September
7,
2015
ABSTRACT: This study aims to evaluate measures against the Urban Heat Island (UHI) regarding artificial exhaust heat of road traffic using Geographic Information Systems (GIS) in the Tokyo Ward Area where the degree of UHI is particularly strong. We developed a GIS database that reflected road traffic conditions, and calculated the volume of artificial exhaust heat of road traffic to evaluate measures against the UHI. The findings of this study can be summarized in the following three points. 1) Artificial exhaust heat volume for moving targets was remarkably higher than that of stationary targets and, in particular, artificial exhaust heat volume was high on roads with remarkable numbers of vehicles and running speeds such as expressways and ring roads. 2) In UHI- related policy for moving targets, the suppression of waste heat through choice of fuel burned, improvement of traffic flow by securing space for cyclists and pedestrians, development of bypasses, and upgrading signal control managed to reduce artificial exhaust heat volume, even though there were differences in degree of reduction. 3) In UHI-related policy for stationary targets, special road surfaces and the increase in efficiency of energy consumption equipment achieved a reduction ratio of around 30% in artificial exhaust heat volume, more than moving targets as well as making it possible to expect a reduction in artificial exhaust heat volume on a wide scale.