Shadow maps help designers in urban planning by which of the following?

• A. Identifying flood risk areas.
• B. Planning building footprints to maximize daylight access.
• C. Estimating vehicle emission hotspots.
• D. Understanding the duration of shade across streets formed by buildings.

Answer: (D)

Shadow maps capture how sunlight is blocked by buildings over time, so they show where shade exists and for how long along streets. This temporal shading information is exactly what planners need to understand pedestrian comfort, solar access, and how the microclimate changes throughout the day and year. By visualizing the duration of shade across different streets, designers can optimize street orientation, seating, trees, and shading strategies.

Flood risk, emissions hotspots, and general daylight planning involve different data layers or analyses, so they’re not the direct output of shadow mapping. The key idea is that shadow maps quantify how long streets stay shaded by surrounding buildings.