Climate Adaptation and Indoor Comfort Improvement Strategies for Buildings in High-Cold Regions: Empirical Study from Ganzi Region, China

The improvement of building and living conditions in high-cold areas has always been an issue worthy of attention, but there is currently no research using field survey data for evaluation. The Ganzi region, based in the western plateau of China, is a typical example for such a study. Restricted by factors such as natural conditions and economic level, the winter indoor thermal environment of western plateau houses is generally poor. Taking the new residential houses in the Ganzi region as a case study, the authors of this paper conducted field research and analyses. First, the authors analyzed the construction technology and functional layout of the building through thermal environment testing and investigation; second, the authors analyzed the user’s activity path according to the production and lifestyle; thirdly, the authors comprehensively evaluated the indoor thermal comfort through questionnaires and a predicated mean vote (PMV)-predicted percentage dissatisfied (PPD) evaluation model. The research results showed that: (1) the construction technology, functional layout, and temperature distribution of the new residential building were consistent with the user’s activity path, which could effectively improve thermal insulation ability and thermal comfort; (2) compared to the developed eastern regions, the users in the building showed a stronger tolerance and wider acceptable temperature range in the extreme climate environment; and (3) under certain cooperative work conditions, an indoor temperature of 10–14 °C could meet basic thermal environment requirements and thus lower the limits of the standards. The author’s method was proven to be more resilient than current standards in dealing with climate change. Therefore, this research can provide a practical reference for the improvement of peoples’ living conditions and sustainable development in cold regions and other harsh areas.

Evidence-Based Design for Waiting Space Environment of Pediatric Clinics—Three Hospitals in Shenzhen as Case Studies

This study explores the waiting space environment of pediatric clinics in general hospitals and the relationships between the use of space, behavioral activities and overall satisfaction. Patients often spend a lot of time waiting for doctors, and child patients waiting to be seen are particularly likely to feel bored, depressed and anxious, which negatively affects their overall experience of seeking medical attention. Since the launch of China’s second-child policy, the number of children born in China has surged. As medical resources for children are in short supply and of uneven quality, it is urgently necessary to carry out research on optimizing the design of children’s waiting space in Chinese hospitals to improve their medical environment and experience. Method: This study identified four first-level indicators and twenty-seven second-level indicators in four dimensions: functional layout (layout and area), flow organization, supporting facilities and environmental details (physical and landscape environment). The research combined subjective and objective methods, including comprehensive observation, a questionnaire survey and interviews, taking three hospitals in Shenzhen as case studies. Results: The study found that the waiting space in pediatric clinics currently fails to meet key patient needs in areas such as mother and infant rooms, children’s play areas and drinking water facilities, and there are widespread problems with the creation of natural environments, such as views of natural scenery from windows and indoor green plants. Six factors were found to significantly positively influence overall satisfaction with waiting space, describing 69.76% of the changes in the respondents’ degree of satisfaction with the waiting environment. Supporting facilities and aspects of the physical environment had the greatest influence on overall satisfaction with the waiting space. Conclusion: Optimizing the design of the waiting space in pediatric clinics, with a focus on functional layout, flow organization, supporting facilities and environmental details, can improve overall satisfaction with pediatric waiting rooms. The results are preliminary; they need to be further tested in practice to complete the process of evidence-based design. This will lead to suggestions for refining the design of pediatric waiting units which can be used by architects and hospital administrators.

Comparative Review of Worship Spaces in Buddhist and Cistercian Monasteries: The Three Temples of Guoqing Si (China) and the Church of the Royal Abbey of Santa Maria de Poblet (Spain)

Although the two parallel architectural forms, Han Buddhists and the Cistercian monasteries, seem, on the surface, to be very different—belonging to different religions, different cultural backgrounds, and different ways of construction—they share many similarities in the internal institutional model of monks’ lives and the corresponding architectural core values. The worship space plays the most significant role in both monastic life and layout. In this study, the Three Temples of Guoqing Si and the Church of the Royal Abbey of Santa Maria de Poblet are used as examples to elucidate the connotations behind the architectural forms, in order to further explore how worship spaces serve as an intermediary between deities, monks, and pilgrims. Based on field research and experience of monastic life, this comparative study highlights two fundamental similarities between the Three Temples and the Church: First, both worship spaces are derived from imperial prototypes, have a similar priority of construction, occupy the most important place in both sacred venues, and both serve as a reference for the development of monastic layout. Second, both worship spaces are composed of a similar programmed functional layout, including similar space dominators as well as itineraries. Beyond the surface similarities, this article further analyzes the reasons behind the three differences found. Due to their different understanding of deities, both worship spaces show different ways of worship, images of deities, and distances towards them.

A Novel Uni-directional Flow Circular Facility Layout for Effective Social Distancing

Hospitals have a complex infrastructure with a wide range of functional units of medical services. A well-designed facility layout planning is essential for the smooth functioning as well as to provide safe and convenient services to patients at the right time. A functional layout is suggested to optimize time and resources in the process of service delivery, reducing the challenges of patients and healthcare professionals involved in patient care. This article focuses on developing a new facility functional layout that promotes convenience, comfort and economy with enhanced quality of medical care. A pathway of patient movement is effectively designed for better health outcomes, especially when there is a huge inflow of patients seeking information about the choice of healthcare facilities and subsequent medical attention. A circular hospital facility layout with unidirectional flow is proposed, which will effectively prevent face-to-face movement of incoming and outgoing patients and their bystanders, thereby preventing spread of diseases or infection and speed up the service delivery process. The authors believe that the proposed layout will substantially improve quality, service and speed of medical procedures, though the initial investment might be higher for implementing this layout. This study is of paramount importance in maintaining social distancing at hospitals as it prevents chaotic movement of patients and more specifically total avoidance of face-to-face situations between incoming and outgoing patients.

EXPERIMENTAL METHODS OF ASSESSING THE EFFICIENCY OF USE OF SMOKE AND HEAT REMOVAL

The results of the experimental studies on the determination of the smoke reduction coefficient and the temperature reduction coefficient during the implementation of three variants of gas-air environment normalization in the test box are presented, namely during the creation of a smoky and high-temperature environment and subsequent self-reduction of the smoke time. smoke and heat removal by injection of air and by simultaneous supply of air and sprayed at the water jet to the test box using portable portable smoke and heat removal. A large number of firefighting cases are associated with the hazardous effects on the personnel of hazardous fire factors. In particular, the effects of high temperatures and smoke greatly complicate rescue work and firefighting. An important tactical way to reduce such an impact on the personnel of the fire and rescue units is to control the flue streams of the fire by means of portable means of smoke and heat removal, which are functionally intended for local increase of air pressure by injection of air into the area of ​​work of personnel or removal of products from the mountains. fire conditions for normalization of temperature and air environment. At present, there are almost no portable means of smoke and heat removal in the fire-fighting units of the State Emergency Service of Ukraine. Considering that in the period from 2014 to 2018 during the firefighting and elimination of the consequences of emergencies in Ukraine, there was a tendency to increase the number of used units of gas and fire protection service from fires from 5802 to 7804 and increase their operating time from 1704 h to 2544 h. the need for widespread use of fire and rescue units and portable means of smoke and heat removal. n order to assist in solving this problem, a functional layout of a portable smoke and heat extraction type was created at the Ukrainian Research Institute of Civil Protection within the framework of the research work "Smoke and Heat Removal Means". According to the developed methodology, the experts of the institute conducted experimental studies to determine the smoke reduction coefficient and the temperature reduction coefficient in the fire room during the use of such means. The results of the experimental studies are presented in the appropriate graphs.

Globalisation and its impact on the creation of sustainable points of purchase

In the second half of the 1990s, important global traders began to come to the Slovak market, changing the functional layout of the towns and cities by building large-scale stores, bringing new formats and forms of selling to retails, as well as thoughtful external and internal shop designs. More than twenty years have passed since then, however, internationalmarketers continue to shape the Slovak retail market, this time through a sustainable architecture of shops and logistics centres, responsible product assortments, reduced food waste, separating and reducing paper or plastic packaging and batteries, changing the employees´ clothing for garments from organic cottons, and so on. They have namely realized that the environment is more affected than protected as a result of globalization, and it is therefore necessary to take measures to protect the natural world with regard to permanently sustainable principles. The object of our research is the shopping setting in retail stores of selected worldwide retail chains operating in Slovakia, i.e. all elements of the retail shop and its operation (its design, layout, goods presentation, staff and customers), in the context of sustainability. We are looking for answers to the questions of which selected global retail chain stores working in Slovakia and by implementing of which specific measures they build sustainable points of sale. In the process of elaborating the paper we used as sources of information relevant publications, proceedings of scholarly papers, as well as studies available at the Internet sites of specialized journals. At elaborating the sources, we applied standard scientific methods: researching, description, analysis, and deduction.

Exploration of beautiful village renovation against the backdrop of global tourism

With the rise of global tourism, construction of villages is facing changes in development goals and priorities. Facing the tasks of physical environment improvement and function improvement, a multi-dimensional beautiful village renovation system of functions, architecture, environment, and facilities is constructed. Taking the Qixi group of Jiangkou village, Zhangfang Town, Liuyang City as an example, based on the basic characteristics of natural resource, historical and cultural traditions, etc., it has promoted the overall improvement of village functions from four aspects: overall functional layout, building renovation, road renovation, and landscape. The purpose is to explore an effective way to renovate beautiful villages under the background of global tourism, and provide some practical guidance for the future renovation of beautiful villages.