*HUBBUB 26 People’s Choice Award Winner: Tied for most responsive to the project question.*

As extreme summer heat events become more frequent, rising temperatures in Vancouver pose severe health risks, including heat exhaustion and UV damage. This is especially dangerous for pedestrians, commuters, and outdoor workers navigating the city. To address this problem, our team, BBY-19 consisting of Valerie Polania, Hannah Shiang, Simon Tran, Alex Balog, Wenting Yang, and Adrien Cyr, developed Vancooler, a dynamic, shadow-aware web application. Unlike traditional map applications that highlight generic commercial amenities, Vancooler is specifically optimized for heat relief. By utilizing API integration and shadow simulation, our app visualizes real-time shade patterns across public sidewalks based on the precise time of day, building heights, and the actual locations of individual trees. Crucially, we expanded our map to include life-saving cooling Points of Interest (POIs). Users can easily locate nearby water stations, public washrooms, parks, and community centers. This approach empowers users to proactively plan heat-safe travel routes. Our primary outcome was the successful deployment of a fully functional prototype that proves the technical viability of accessible, heat-focused mapping. Throughout the development process, our team gained valuable hands-on experience integrating multiple APIs and complex environmental data into a single platform. We learned how to effectively balance this heavy technical processing with an intuitive, user-friendly interface.

Next Steps

Our primary next step is to formally share our completed project, technical findings, and recommendations with our CityStudio partners and our instructors. While some of our team members might continue working on refining the application’s features in the future, our main goal for the end of this term was to deliver a strong, conceptual prototype to the City.

We hope that by sharing our work with City staff, our shadow simulation framework can serve as a foundational stepping stone or inspire them to implement similar shade-routing features into official municipal applications. Even if our specific app is not deployed city-wide, we want to ensure the momentum we built around heat safety continues. Ultimately, we would love to see this concept lead to permanent, city-supported initiatives that keep Vancouver’s community cool, safe, and protected during future summer heatwaves.