“The Urban Poor and Vulnerable Are Hit Hardest by the Heat”: A Heat Equity Lens to Understand Community Perceptions of Climate Change, Urban Heat Islands, and Green Infrastructure

Mahbubur Meenar (), Md Shahinoor Rahman, Jason Russack, Sarah Bauer and Kul Kapri
Additional contact information
Mahbubur Meenar: Department of Geography, Planning, and Sustainability, Rowan University, Glassboro, NJ 08028, USA
Md Shahinoor Rahman: Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, New Jersey City University, Jersey City, NJ 07305, USA
Jason Russack: Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Rowan University, Glassboro, NJ 08028, USA
Sarah Bauer: Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Rowan University, Glassboro, NJ 08028, USA

Land, 2023, vol. 12, issue 12, 1-21

Abstract: As the global temperature and rapid urbanization continue to rise, urban heat islands (UHIs) also continue to increase across the world. Following the heat equity concept, UHIs disproportionately impact disadvantaged or overburdened communities. Green infrastructure (GI) has been at the forefront of UHI mitigation efforts, including nature-based solutions like parks, pervious open spaces, wooded areas, green roofs, rain gardens, and shade trees. In this paper, we use a heat equity lens to analyze community perceptions of the intersection of climate change, UHI, and GI in Camden, New Jersey—a post-industrial city with a history of environmental injustices. Based on a mixed-methods analysis of survey responses ( n = 107), 11 years of relevant X (formerly Twitter) posts ( n = 367), and geospatial data, we present community perceptions of and connections between climate change, UHI, and GI and discuss major themes that emerged from the data: perceived heat inequity in Camden triggers negative emotions; a public knowledge gap exists regarding climate change-UHI-GI connections; and perceived inequitable distribution of GI and certain GI planning and maintenance practices may negatively impact UHI mitigation strategies. We argue these themes are useful to urban planners and relevant professionals while planning for heat equity and mitigating UHI effects in disadvantaged urban communities like Camden.

Keywords: heat equity planning; environmental justice; heat mitigation; climate preparedness; social media data mining (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q15 Q2 Q24 Q28 Q5 R14 R52 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2073-445X/12/12/2174/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2073-445X/12/12/2174/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jlands:v:12:y:2023:i:12:p:2174-:d:1301451

Access Statistics for this article

Land is currently edited by Ms. Carol Ma

More articles in Land from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().