Design Transition of Emirati Public Housing from Urban Sprawl to Vertical Urban Forms: Impacts on Energy and Ecological Performances

Abstract

The United Arab Emirates has adopted environmental sustainability agendas for urban development and housing levels. In response, the urban design of public housing has been transformed from a low-rise urban sprawl housing typology into more compact urban forms and recently into vertical urban forms. While the social aspects related to Emirati families have been carefully preserved in the designs of all these public housing typologies, the environmental sustainability aspects have not been rigorously assessed in these designs, especially at the urban scale. To address this, this study was aimed at assessing the energy and ecological performance of a recent pioneering vertical public housing p..