Scenarios simulations of Prague (TURBAN-D05)

Basic information

This dataset contains simulation results for the so-called Holešovičky domain, an area in the city of Prague, Czech Republic, expected to undergo major traffic infrastructure changes in the near future. Three scenarios were modelled: current infrastructure with traffic intensity projections for 2023 (C1), future outlook with a finished part of city inner ring-road in 2030 (C2) and effect of finishing the northern part of the Prague outer ring-road (C3), which will decrease heavy traffic in the domain. Note that all scenarios have slightly different landcover (trees, buildings, bridges, tunnels etc.), so there could be small areas containing NA values in the maps and GIS files. All times are in UTC (local time, CEST is UTC +02:00).

For more detailed description of the experiments see the TURBAN project website at https://www.project-turban.eu/.

General organisation

Each scenario has two folders; post-processed results from the PALM model as averaged ASCII files that can be viewed in many GIS applications (output-gis) and maps in the PNG format (output-png). Each variable was averaged from original 10min values to 1, 3 and 24-hour averages. The C1 scenario was used as a baseline. In addition to that, also differences for all variables were calculated for the scenarios C2 and C3. In total, the C1 scenario has 3 subfolders with absolute values (prefix abs), the scenarios C2 and C3 have 6 (3 with absolute values and 3 with differences; prefix diff).

Modelled variables

Each subfolder includes 7 subfolders with variables. Variable bio_mrt is the Mean Radiant Temperature (MRT), bio_pet is the Physiological Equivalent Temperature (PET), bio_utci is the Universal Thermal Climate Index (UTCI), kc_PM10_02m is the concentration of PM10 at 2m above ground, theta_2m is the potential temperature at 2m above ground, tsurf is the surface temperature and wspeed_10m is the wind speed at 10m above ground.

File nomenclature

Each file (PRJ or ASC, PNG) has the same nomenclature. An example (bio_utci_abs-01h_20190724_1200-1300.png) could be parsed as: variable name (bio_utci), processed output (abs-01h), date (20190724) and averaged period (1200-1300). So, the result is a map with hourly averaged UTCI for 24 Jul 2019 between 12:00 and 13:00 UTC.

Important note

During the processing phase a few potentially important problems were identified and need to be analysed in detail. One of them are extremely overestimated concentrations due to stable conditions from boundary condition inputs. In certain situations it can happen that the best regional meteorological model can provide inappropriate input conditions for some episode. This needs to be checked in detail before any following interpretation.

Acknowledgements

The PALM simulations, and pre- and postprocessing were performed partially on the HPC infrastructure of the Institute of Computer Science of the Czech Academy of Sciences (ICS), supported by the long-term strategic development financing of the ICS (RVO:67985807) and partially on the IT4I HPC infrastructure supported by the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports of the Czech Republic through the e-INFRA CZ (ID:90254). The work was performed within the project TURBAN (TO01000219; TURBAN – Turbulent-resolving urban modelling of air quality and thermal comfort) supported by Norway Grants and Technology Agency of the Czech Republic.