The winner of Esri Young Scholars Award 2017 Mr. Wong Kiu-ho Kenneth, a student from the Department of Urban Planning & Design, Faculty of Architecture, The University of Hong Kong, received the award from Jack Dangermond, Founder and President of Esri, at 2017 Esri International User Conference (2017 Esri UC) in San Diego.

Kenneth Wong (right to Jack) received his award from Jack Dangermond.

Esri Young Scholars Award program recognizes the exemplary work of current undergraduate and graduate students majoring in geospatial science disciplines at international universities. Award winners have the opportunity to travel to San Diego, where Esri UC was held, to present their work and join near 18,000 GIS professionals in a weeklong program of presentations, workshops, and social events.

Esri China (HK) first promotes this award locally so as to celebrate our 20th Anniversary in 2017. The goal of the competition is to encourage and recognize university students in creating more innovative GIS applications that can lead to a better society and meet the diversified needs of the metropolitan Hong Kong. The response of the competition was very good and the works from the candidates are all very impressive and investigative.

A Study on Traffic Noise Pollution

Kenneth’s award-winning work, titled “The Dirty of Loudness – Investigation on the traffic noise pollution to residents in Western District”, aims to investigate how the traffic noise affects the public health of people living in Western District of Hong Kong.

“The Dirty of Loudness” Story Map showing the noise level of buildings next to the flyover.

From the result of the study, there are around 48,400 residents living in the noisy area during the peak hour of 8AM daily. Even at 3AM when the traffic flow is the lowest, there are still around 14,700 residents suffering from traffic noise.

Kenneth suggested the Government could retrofit major trunk roads with noise barriers and subsidize residents to install double glazed windows, in order to minimize the impacts of the noise and provide a quieter living environment for the residents.

Kenneth was answering an attendee’s enquiry when his work was being displayed in 2017 Esri UC.

Kenneth’s work was displayed in the conference hall of 2017 Esri UC alongside other Young Scholar Award winners from around the world. We trust that he has gained precious experience and insights by answering questions from numerous attendees during the event.

To learn more about this inspiring and innovative GIS application, please click the links below:

“The Dirty of Loudness – Investigation on the traffic noise pollution to residents in Western District” Story Map: http://arcg.is/2mLLWP7

Poster Presentation: click here

Media Coverages and Articles:

西區60幢樓車聲滋擾超標（Headline Daily）

Esri青年學人賽 港大生夠貼地奪冠（Hong Kong Economic Journal，StartUpBeat）

「Esri 青年學人大賽」 鼓勵學生關注民生（Oriental Daily News）

港大生研噪音 西區60幢樓全日超標（Sing Tao Daily）

噪音擾西區4成樓 港大生研究奪國際獎（Sky Post）

港大生研究噪音獲國際獎（TaKungPao）

建數模研噪音 港大生奪獎 揭西區樓宇挨交通「音攻」 獲邀下月赴美專家大會（WenWeiPo）