Growth Simulation of Trees Considering City Environment

In a city, roadside trees are regularly pruned. The pruning also not only changes the shape of the trees immediately but also changes subsequent growth of them. In addition, artificial illumination, which is caused by the light coming in through windows or caused by street lights, changes growth of the trees. Such conditions are not supported by the conventional tree growth models. Thus, we developed the growth simulation system of trees in city environment. The system has an interactive pruning interface including the functions for assisting the pruning. And the system grows trees after the pruning by referring the illumination environment of the city.

In the experiment, a shape of a tree which has branches biased to the pavement side was generated by using the system. Moreover, the tree shape with a thin branch connected to a thick trunk was successfully generated by repeating the pruning and the growth. They are the features well seen to street trees.