Interaction of Urban Rivers and Green Space Morphology to Mitigate the Urban Heat Island Effect: Case-Based Comparative Analysis

Yunfang Jiang, Jing Huang, Tiemao Shi and Hongxiang Wang
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Yunfang Jiang: School of Urban and Regional Science, East China Normal University, Shanghai 200241, China
Jing Huang: School of Urban and Regional Science, East China Normal University, Shanghai 200241, China
Tiemao Shi: Institute of Spatial Planning and Design, Shenyang Jianzhu University, Shenyang 110168, China
Hongxiang Wang: School of Journalism and Communication, Sichuan International Studies University, Chongqing 400031, China

IJERPH, 2021, vol. 18, issue 21, 1-29

Abstract: The spatial morphology of waterfront green spaces helps generate cooling effects to mitigate the urban heat island effect (UHI) in metropolis cities. To explore the contribution and influence of multi-dimensional spatial indices on the mitigation of UHIs, the green space of the riparian buffer along 18 river channels in Shanghai was considered as a case study. The spatial distribution data of the land surface temperature (LST) in the study area were obtained by using remote sensing images. By selecting the related spatial structure morphological factors of the waterfront green space as the quantitative description index, the growth regression tree model (BRT) was adapted to analyze the contribution of various indexes of the waterfront green space on the distribution of the LST and the marginal effect of blue–green synergistic cooling. In addition, mathematical statistical analysis and spatial analysis methods were used to study the influence of the morphological group (MG) types of riparian green spaces with different morphological characteristics on the LST. The results showed that in terms of the spatial structure variables between blue and green spaces, the contribution of river widths larger than 30 m was more notable in decreasing the LST. In the case of a larger river width, the marginal effect of synergistic cooling could be observed in farther regions. The green space that had the highest connectivity degree and was located in the leeward direction of the river exhibited the lowest LST. In terms of the spatial morphology, the fractional cover values of the vegetation (Fv) and area (A) of the green space were the main factors affecting the cooling effect of the green space. For all MG types, a large green patch that had a high green coverage and connectivity degree, as well as was distributed in the leeward direction of the river, corresponded to the lowest LST. The research presented herein can provide methods and development suggestions for optimizing spatial thermal comfort in climate adaptive cities.

Keywords: urban heat island (UHI); blue–green space; spatial morphology; urban cooling effect (UCI); boosted regression trees (BRT); marginal effect (ME); Shanghai (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (13)

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