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Urban Greening and Microclimate Modification

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Greening Cities

Part of the book series: Advances in 21st Century Human Settlements ((ACHS))

Abstract

Vegetation is promoted widely all over the world as a means of creating a better quality of life in cities. Plants are credited with lowering air temperature and development of green spaces is considered one of the main strategies for mitigating the urban heat island. This chapter examines the mechanisms by which plants can modify the urban microclimate , with an emphasis on air temperature and outdoor thermal comfort. It outlines a scheme for classifying urban vegetation according to its location in the city and its intended role, which may be useful for planners and landscape architects. The chapter concludes with a methodology for integrating vegetation in the urban planning process to best achieve the desired microclimatic effects.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Estimates of Tmrt may be obtained from field measurements employing the globe thermometer (Thorsson et al. 2007). Computer simulation of Tmrt is provided by programs such as ENVI-Met (Bruse and Fleer 1998), which computes the temperature of the ground, building and vegetation and requires extremely detailed inputs; or simpler tools such as RayMan (Matzarakis et al. 2007) or SOLWEIG (Lindberg et al. 2008), which do not require input of the thermal properties other than albedo of the surfaces and which thus rely on an approximation of the surface temperatures.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beersheba, Israel

    Evyatar Erell

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  1. Evyatar Erell
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Correspondence to Evyatar Erell .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. National University of Singapore, Singapore, Singapore

    Puay Yok Tan

  2. The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China

    Chi Yung Jim

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Erell, E. (2017). Urban Greening and Microclimate Modification. In: Tan, P., Jim, C. (eds) Greening Cities. Advances in 21st Century Human Settlements. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-4113-6_4

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