THE COMPARISON OF SNOW AND WIND IMPACTS BETWEEN HIGH-RISE AND MEDIUM-RISE BUILDING BLOCKS USING THE WIND TUNNEL SIMULATION FOR SNOW AND COLD CITIES

In cold and heavy snow cities, original urban design approaches are required against snow and strong wind in winter. We showed the comparison to snow and wind affects between medium rise and high rise urban block using the wind tunnel simulation in case of downtown area of Sapporo city. Consisting of medium rise buildings up to eight floors is better than high rise buildings 14 floors for reducing snowdrift and strong wind with snow. Finally, we pointed out seven urban design guidelines for winter cities. This paper shows the new approaches for urban design in cold and heavy snow cities.