INTERFERENCE EFFECTS OF AN ADJACENT BUILDING ON LOCAL PEAK WIND PRESSURES ON A HIGH-RISE BUILDING

Interference effects for largest maximum and smallest minimum peak wind pressures on the walls of an identical pair of high-rise buildings were studied via a series of wind tunnel experiments using a wind pressure model. Various locations of an interfering building of identical cross-section and height were considered. The wind terrain condition was represented as urban wind exposure with a power law exponent 0.33. Measured local peak wind pressure coefficients were compared with those for the walls of an isolated building. The results show that the local peak wind pressure coefficients for the walls of the principal building were higher or lower depending on the location of the interfering building, and were largely induced by the wake separated from the edges of an upwind interfering building. An interesting observation was that when the interfering building was located at (-1.5B, 0.5B), the smallest minimum peak wind pressure coefficient for the leeward wall of the principal building was increased to -3.34, while that for the leeward wall of the isolated building was increased to -1.98. It is suggested that a downwind building (interfering building) located at (-1.5B, 0.5B) deflects the flow separated from the right edge of the windward wall of the principal building, causing a change in wind speed and wind direction around the interfering building, and the building-spawned wind may increase the local minimum peak wind pressures coefficients on the right-hand side of the leeward wall of the principal building.