Supporting data for “Diversity of summertime thermal experiences in subtropical residential public spaces: Case studies in Hong Kong’s public housing estates”

This dataset contains data and codes used in PhD thesis entitled "Diversity of summertime thermal experiences in subtropical residential public spaces: Case studies in Hong Kong’s public housing estates".Rising extreme heat events pose challenges to designing healthy and comfortable outdoor public spaces of high environmental quality, especially in subtropical high-density urban contexts. The diversity of outdoor thermal environment offers a potential solution to future-heat-resilient urban and landscape design, particularly when considering human adaptations and dynamic behaviors in outdoor environments.By taking public housing estates in subtropical high-density Hong Kong as case studies, thermal environments and individuals’ thermal experiences in three typological types of public spaces, i.e., open squares, vegetated spaces, and semi-outdoor spaces, were evaluated, with (1) microclimate measurements conducted to characterize the diversity of outdoor thermal environments under current extreme heat, (2) walking-based surveys of thermal and environmental perceptions conducted simultaneously with built environment, microclimate variables and human skin temperature measurements to build the influencing pathways, (3) future extreme heat scenarios simulated with ENVI-met and human outdoor thermal experiences modeled with JOS-3, and (4) context-specific guidelines developed based on scientific evidence.This thesis emphasizes the significance of diversity in outdoor thermal environments and experiences under extreme heat. Such diversity can be harnessed through evidence-based design and assessed using modeling approaches, providing pathways for designing climate-resilient public spaces in the face of future extreme heat.