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Heat islands review
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Paper · Urban Climate Letters · 2025
Street trees and night-time heat in dense neighbourhoods
I. Okafor, L. Brandt, S. Varga
Across 41 blocks, surface temperatures after sunset fell fastest where canopy covered more than a third of the street. The effect held even when wind speed and building height were accounted for, which suggests shade stored during the day matters more than evening airflow.
3.2 Results by street width
Narrow streets with mature trees cooled 1.8 °C more than wide avenues with young plantings. Grass verges added little once canopy was present, and reflective paving only helped where trees were absent.
Measurements were taken at 22:00 over three summers using fixed sensors at 2 m height.
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heat-review-sources.zip · 14 files
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Add citation · Okafor et al., 2025
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Section 2 · Method
Sensors were mounted at 2 m on lamp posts along 41 blocks, recording every ten minutes from June to September.
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Can you put section 3 in simpler terms?
Oriel
Streets with lots of mature trees stay cooler after dark, because the shade they gave during the day kept the ground from storing heat. Wind made little difference. (p. 6)
Which paper disagrees?
Oriel
The 2024 pavement trial finds reflective paving works as well, but only on streets without trees. (p. 12)
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Draft · Discussion
Canopy, not wind, explains most of the night-time difference between streets.
Suggested citation
Okafor, Brandt & Varga (2025), Urban Climate Letters, p. 6
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