Exploring Urban Heat Islands: A Special Issue on the Environmental Impacts and Root Causes

A special issue of Urban Science (ISSN 2413-8851).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (1 July 2024) | Viewed by 2338

Special Issue Editors


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Guest Editor
Department of Environmental Health Sciences, The University of Alabama, Birmingham, AB, USA
Interests: climate and health; disaster resiliency; hydrology and hydraulics; machine learning; geospatial analytics

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Guest Editor
Department of Environmental Health Sciences, The University of Alabama, Birmingham, AB, USA
Interests: sustainable cities; environmental risk; air pollution; urban morphology; microclimate; urban health

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Guest Editor
Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, The University of Alabama, Birmingham, AB, USA
Interests: heat exposure; urban climate; climate change and vulnerability; sustainable smart cities; microclimate; urban health

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Guest Editor
Department of Biology, Chemistry, Mathematics, and Computer Science, University of Montevallo, Montevallo, AB, USA
Interests: contextualized understanding of user behavior and interaction; domain-specific algorithms and tools utilizing machine learning and deep learning technologies

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Urban heat islands (UHIs) represent a critical challenge for sustainable urban development as they contribute to increased energy consumption, poor air quality, and negative health outcomes. This Special Issue aims to comprehensively understand the environmental effects and causes of heat islands, enabling researchers, policymakers, and urban planners to develop effective mitigation strategies.

The focus of this Special Issue is to delve into the complex interplay of factors that contribute to the formation and persistence of urban heat islands. The Special Issue will explore various aspects of UHIs, including the roles of urban surfaces and materials, reduced vegetation and green spaces, anthropogenic heat generation, and altered wind patterns in urban environments. By examining the mechanisms underlying UHIs, this Special Issue seeks to provide valuable insights into potential solutions for mitigating their environmental and health impacts.

The scope of the Special Issue encompasses a wide range of topics related to UHIs, including but not limited to the following:

- The physical and meteorological processes that drive UHI formation and intensity;

- The impacts of UHIs on energy consumption, air quality, and public health;

- The role of urban planning and design in exacerbating or mitigating UHI effects;

- The effectiveness of various strategies, such as green infrastructure, cool roofs, and urban forestry, in reducing UHI-related risks;

- The influence of climate change on the frequency and intensity of UHIs;

- Socioeconomic disparities and the unequal distribution of UHI-related vulnerabilities;

- The potential for technological innovations to address UHI challenges.

This Special Issue will feature original research articles, review articles, case studies, and policy analyses that provide a multidisciplinary perspective on UHIs and their environmental implications.

By fostering dialogue among researchers, practitioners, and policymakers, the Issue aims to promote the development and implementation of innovative solutions for mitigating the adverse consequences of UHIs. This Special Issue seeks to inspire further research and action in addressing the complex issue of urban heat islands and their impacts on urban environments and human well-being by highlighting the importance of interdisciplinary research and collaboration.

Dr. Md Golam Rabbani Fahad
Dr. Maryam Karimi
Dr. Samain Sabrin
Dr. Md Mahfuzer Rahman
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Urban Science is an international peer-reviewed open access quarterly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • urban heat island
  • climate change
  • heat stress
  • sustainable urban development
  • geospatial assessment
  • resiliency, vulnerability
  • machine learning, big data analytics
  • heat-related illness and mortality
  • built environment
  • green infrastructure and nature-based solutions

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Published Papers (1 paper)

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Research

23 pages, 7969 KiB  
Article
Unraveling the Tourism–Environment–Equity Nexus: A Neighborhood-Scale Analysis of Texas Urban Centers
by Omid Mansourihanis, Ayda Zaroujtaghi, Moein Hemmati, Mohammad Javad Maghsoodi Tilaki and Mahdi Alipour
Urban Sci. 2024, 8(3), 82; https://doi.org/10.3390/urbansci8030082 - 10 Jul 2024
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1241
Abstract
This study explores the complex interplay between air pollution, the socioeconomic conditions, and the tourism density within Texas’s urban landscapes, focusing on Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, and Austin. Despite extensive research on environmental justice and urban tourism separately, few studies have integrated these [...] Read more.
This study explores the complex interplay between air pollution, the socioeconomic conditions, and the tourism density within Texas’s urban landscapes, focusing on Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, and Austin. Despite extensive research on environmental justice and urban tourism separately, few studies have integrated these fields to examine how tourism development intersects with environmental and socioeconomic disparities at a neighborhood level. This research addresses this gap by employing advanced geospatial analyses and multi-criteria decision analysis to reveal the pronounced clustering of stressed communities on urban peripheries, often removed from tourism’s economic benefits. The study uniquely quantifies the spatial mismatches between tourist hotspots and areas of environmental stress, a dimension often overlooked in the environmental justice literature. Local spatial statistics and cumulative impact analysis uncover statistically significant correlations between high poverty levels and elevated air pollution in specific locales. The results show varying patterns across cities, with Austin presenting the lowest inequality levels and San Antonio exhibiting significant disparities. This granular, neighborhood-centric approach provides novel insights into the tourism–environment–equity nexus, addressing the lack of comprehensive studies linking these factors in rapidly growing Texan metropolitan areas. The findings underscore the critical need for targeted policy interventions and neighborhood-specific approaches in diagnosing urban environmental disparities and crafting equitable urban development policies that consider tourism’s impact on local communities. Full article
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