Urban Surface Parameters Research Articles

Analysis of urban heat island effect based on changes of urban surface parameters

With the accelerated development of urbanization and industrialization, the scope of cities continues to expand. However, natural landscape such as vegetation and water in the city has been transformed into artificial impervious water. This has aggravated urban heat island effect and caused serious damage to the urban eco-logical environment. To explore the relevant factors that affect urban heat island effect, this study selects Tianjin, which has a high level of urbanization and a significant heat island effect, as the study area. Land satellite remote sensing images from 2013, 2018, and 2022 were selected for data acquisition. The analysis was conducted from the perspective of urban surface parameters changes. The selected urban surface parameters for this study include vegetation index, water body index, impermeable surface index, and surface temperature index. The heat island area will increase over time. In 2013, 2018, and 2022, the proportion of this area to the total area was 41.92%, 48.73%, and 49.16%, respectively. In 2022, the pro-portion of different regions in total area ranges from 40.21% to 54.22%. At this time, the heat island area of Dongli District is the largest and that of Jinnan District is the smallest. Surface temperature is negatively correlated with vegetation and water bodies, and positively correlated with impermeable water surfaces. Be-tween 2013 and 2022, over 90% of impermeable water surfaces belonged to heat island area, over 80% of vegetation belonged to green island area, and over 97% of water bodies belonged to green island area. In conclusion, the method proposed in the study can well analyze urban heat island effect and urban surface parameters change?s connection. This provides solid scientific data support for alleviating the heat island effect.

The impacts of urban anthropogenic heat and surface albedo change on boundary layer meteorology and air pollutants in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region

In this study, present and future anthropogenic heat flux (AH) and surface albedo (SA) in Beijing are estimated and incorporated into the WRF-Chem/UCM model. A series of nested model simulations are conducted at 9 km and 27 km horizontal grid resolution with 30 layers in the vertical to explore the sensitivity of model results to urban surface characteristics during the study period from 23 February to 13 March 2014, and the impacts of anthropogenic heat and surface albedo changes in the future on urban meteorology and air pollutants in Beijing. Model validation demonstrates that the model with the up-to-date urban surface parameters apparently improves predictions for both meteorological variables and chemical species compared with model results with default urban parameters. The combined effect of SA increase and AH decrease leads to consistent decreases in T2 (air temperature at 2 m above ground), WS10 (wind speed at 10 m) and PBLH (planetary boundary layer height) by up to 1.2 °C, 0.4 m s−1 and 200 m (33%), respectively, in Beijing averaged over the study period. In response to the meteorological changes, near surface PM2.5 (particulate matter with aerodynamic equivalent diameter below 2.5 μm) concentration increases by up to 15.6 μg m−3 (8.6%), whereas O3 concentration decreases by 2.6 ppb (25.1%), respectively. In daytime, near surface cooling due to SA increase and AH decrease causes a strong downdraft over Beijing urban areas, a wind divergence near the surface and an upslope wind over the western mountain, resulting in aerosol transport from urban district to western mountain slope. At nighttime, surface cooling is weaker than that in daytime, leading to a weaker downdraft over Beijing and a slight downslope wind in the mountain. The combined changes in SA and AH lead to a decrease in T2 by 1.2 °C, a decrease of O3 concentration by approximately 20%, and increases in PM2.5 and its components by 10–17% in daytime averaged over the urban areas of Beijing during the study period, and the above changes are weaker during haze days than those in clean days. The changes in urban surface parameters in Beijing in the future may be benefit for mitigating heat wave and O3 pollution risks, but could increase fine aerosol level and human health risk, which require an optimal strategy for co-benefits of climate change mitigation and air pollution control in future city planning.

Effectiveness of urban surface characteristics as mitigation strategies for the excessive summer heat in cities

Extreme urban heat, influenced by surface characteristics, negatively affects human thermal comfort. Understanding the thermal behaviour of different urban surface parameters (USPs) at large spatial scales is essential for strategic heat mitigation. This study evaluates USPs from several perspectives to assess their comparative effectiveness as heat mitigation strategies. The Air Pollution Model (TAPM) is used to simulate the urban climate of Melbourne for summer 2019 – Australia's warmest year. Fifty-two simulations are tested to represent changes in USPs as in vegetation type, built-cover ratio, building height, green roofs and cool roofs. The results of each simulation are compared with the baseline in terms of heat indices. Roofs with high albedos are found to be the best heat mitigation for reducing daytime temperatures (0.85 albedo; −1.29 °C) while green roofs show the best nighttime efficacy (100 %, −1.15 °C). Vegetation ratio, green and cool roofs show near-linear negative relationships with heat. Cooling is found to be more effective with trees when distributed in both canyon and urban parks than only planted in street canyon. These findings underscore the significance of USP characteristics in heat mitigation that can inform strategic urban planning with spatial arrangements of green infrastructure.

Climate characteristics and the adaptation level to formulate mitigation strategies for a climate-resilient archaeological park

The urban form representation to apply in studies of urban climate is a challenge especially in cities of developing countries. These cities lack planning, thus the urban fabric is heterogeneous and several types of buildings are mixed in the same area. Considering this reality, the paper will compare three methods to calculate urban surface parameters. These parameters were compared with the WUDAPT classification. The software QGIS was used to develop models to calculate the following urban surface parameters: plan area ratio (λp), complete building aspect ratio (λbc), and mean height of buildings (hm). Three grid size were applied for calculations: 100 m, 500 m, and 1 km. λbc was the only geometric property able to express the difference of density and the absolute size of the active surface of buildings as a unique parameter. The methods developed have some advantages: (a) they are based on realistic shapes of buildings, (b) they were developed in a free and open source system, (c) and it is possible to vary the calculation grid size.

Methods to calculate urban surface parameters and their relation to the LCZ classification

The urban form representation to apply in studies of urban climate is a challenge especially in cities of developing countries. These cities lack planning, thus the urban fabric is heterogeneous and several types of buildings are mixed in the same area. Considering this reality, the paper will compare three methods to calculate urban surface parameters. These parameters were compared with the WUDAPT classification. The software QGIS was used to develop models to calculate the following urban surface parameters: plan area ratio (λp), complete building aspect ratio (λbc), and mean height of buildings (hm). Three grid size were applied for calculations: 100 m, 500 m, and 1 km. λbc was the only geometric property able to express the difference of density and the absolute size of the active surface of buildings as a unique parameter. The methods developed have some advantages: (a) they are based on realistic shapes of buildings, (b) they were developed in a free and open source system, (c) and it is possible to vary the calculation grid size.

Analysis of Heat Island Effect in Coastal Cities Based on the Change of Surface Parameters

Zhou, Z.; Deng, Q.L., and Yang, G., 2020. Analysis of heat island effect in coastal cities based on the change of surface parameters. In: Bai, X. and Zhou, H. (eds.), Advances in Water Resources, Environmental Protection, and Sustainable Development. Journal of Coastal Research, Special Issue No. 115, pp. 289-291. Coconut Creek (Florida), ISSN 0749-0208.In order to analyze the influence of urban surface parameters on the heat island effect in coastal cities, it is very important to establish scientific measurement methods and instruments. On this basis, the surface thermal effect measuring device is studied. Combined with the main problems existing in the study of ocean thermal parameters, the overall design scheme of the system is given, including the structural design of the measurement section and the functional design of the system. How to further improve the accuracy of Ocean Climate Measurement prototype is studied. An ultrasonic transducer testing device is designed. In addition, aiming at the disadvantage that the traditional flow algorithm is easy to be affected by the uneven distribution of flow velocity and temperature, a flow segmented interpolation algorithm is studied. Finally, the verification method and test results of the prototype calorimeter are given. The results show that the flow measurement error and temperature measurement error of the calorimeter are within the allowable range. It can meet the design requirements of national secondary meters. At the same time, it has important guiding significance and technical reference value for the follow-up study of the ocean ultrasonic calorimeter.

Surface and Atmospheric Driven Variability of the Single‐Layer Urban Canopy Model Under Clear‐Sky Conditions Over London

AbstractUrban canopy models (UCMs) are parametrization schemes that are used to improve weather forecasts in urban areas. The performance of UCMs depends on understanding potential uncertainty sources that can generally originate from the (a) urban surface parameters, (b) atmospheric forcing, and (c) physical description. Here, we investigate the relative importance of surface and atmospheric driven model sensitivities of the single‐layer urban canopy model when fully interactive with a 1‐D configuration of the Weather Research and Forecasting model (WRF). The impact of different physical descriptions in UCMs and other key parameterization schemes of WRF is considered. As a case study, we use a 54‐hr period with clear‐sky conditions over London. Our analysis is focused on the surface radiation and energy flux partitioning and the intensity of turbulent mixing. The impact of changes in atmospheric forcing and surface parameter values on model performance appears to be comparable in magnitude. The advection of potential temperature, aerosol optical depth, exchange coefficient and roughness length for heat, surface albedo, and the anthropogenic heat flux are the most influential. Some atmospheric forcing variations have similar impact on the key physical processes as changes in surface parameters. Hence, error compensation may occur if one optimizes model performance using a single variable or combinations that have potential for carryover effects (e.g., temperature). Process diagrams help differences to be understood in the physical description of different UCMs, boundary layer, and radiation schemes and between the model and the observations.

Application of MORUSES single‐layer urban canopy model in a tropical city: Results from Singapore

AbstractA tropical version of the high‐resolution (300 m) UK Met Office forecast model (UM) using the MORUSES urban canopy parametrization (UCP) is adapted for Singapore. High‐resolution urban surface parameters are determined using a methodology based on Voronoi polygons applied to a 3D building database. The model is evaluated for clear sky and calm conditions at the neighbourhood scale by comparing its predictions with two sources of observations: energy balance data from an eddy covariance flux tower located in a low‐rise residential area, and a network of sensors measuring screen‐level temperature across the city. The model is able to reproduce the diurnal cycle of the surface energy balance fluxes. Net radiation is overestimated which likely follows from an underestimation in cloud cover and effective surface albedo. This overestimation partly explains the overestimation of the sensible‐ and latent‐heat fluxes. The higher model sensible‐heat flux is further hypothesised to be related to the overestimation of modelled canyon sensible‐heat flux. Its peak exhibits a 1 h delay, similar to simulated roof and canyon surface temperature. The model captures the diurnal cycle of temperature at a height of 20.5 m above ground and at screen level. A night‐time cold bias of 0.1–1.1 K and an overestimation of the daytime peak value are observed at both heights. These deviations are smaller than those predicted by other UCPs reported in the literature. A simple method to estimate the capability of an urban model to qualitatively distinguish screen‐level temperature differences across different urban morphologies is developed which shows that MORUSES is clearly able to represent the impacts of different neighbourhoods on the thermal environment.

Statistical Downscaling of Urban-scale Air Temperatures Using an Analog Model Output Statistics Technique

This study was conducted to evaluate the suitability of an analog model output statistics (MOS) downscaling technique for urban-scale meteorology research and compares this MOS-Analog technique with the sliding window technique. We downscaled air temperatures forecasted for the Seoul metropolitan area from 1.5 km resolution (using data from the Unified Model-Local Data Assimilation and Prediction System, UM-LDAPS) to 25 m resolution using the analog MOS technique described in the paper. The support vector machine (SVM) technique was employed for empirical computational modeling, using urban surface parameters calculated using the Climate Analysis Seoul (CAS) workbench and automated weather station (AWS) observational data as training data. The comparison of the downscaled prediction results with the AWS observations for the periods of July/August 2016 and 2017 resulted in a lower root mean square error (RMSE) and higher correlation coefficients (CC) than those obtained for the LDAPS prediction results. The prediction performance was also stable for September, during which precipitation episodes and seasonal fluctuations occurred. The results of this study demonstrate that the proposed technique, which overcomes the limitations of the sliding window technique, is applicable to urban-scale meteorology research and potentially applicable other areas.

The impacts of urban surface characteristics on radiation balance and meteorological variables in the boundary layer around Beijing in summertime

In this study, some key geometric and thermal parameters derived from recent field and satellite observations in Beijing were collected and incorporated into WRF-UCM (Weather Research and Forecasting) model instead of previous default ones. A series of sensitivity model simulations were conducted to investigate the influences of these parameters on radiation balance, meteorological variables, turbulence kinetic energy (TKE), as well as planetary boundary layer height (PBLH) in regions around Beijing in summer 2014. Model validation demonstrated that the updated parameters represented urban surface characteristics more realistically and the simulations of meteorological variables were evidently improved to be closer to observations than the default parameters. The increase in building height tended to increase and slightly decrease surface air temperature at 2m (T2) at night and around noon, respectively, and to reduce wind speed at 10m (WS10) through a day. The increase in road width led to significant decreases in T2 and WS10 through the whole day, with the maximum changes in early morning and in evening, respectively. Both lower surface albedo and inclusion of anthropogenic heat (AH) resulted in increases in T2 and WS10 over the day, with stronger influence from AH. The vertical extension of the impact of urban surface parameters was mainly confined within 300m at night and reached as high as 1600m during daytime. The increase in building height tended to increase TKE and PBLH and the TKE increase was larger at night than during daytime due to enhancements of both mechanical and buoyant productions. The increase in road width generally reduced TKE and PBLH except for a few hours in the afternoon. The lower surface albedo and the presence of AH consistently resulted in increases of TKE and PBLH through both day and night. The increase in building height induced a slight divergence by day and a notable convergence at night, whereas the increase in road width led to a remarkable divergence through the entire day. Both AH and lower surface albedo induced a wind convergence over the day, which tended to strengthen nighttime mountain downslope wind and daytime southerly wind to the south of Beijing, but to weaken daytime upslope wind in mountain areas.

Sustainable strategies for smart cities: Analysis of the town development effect on surface urban heat island through remote sensing methodologies

In recent years the use of satellite remote sensing techniques has proven to be a useful tool for monitoring urban surface parameters: data provided on the reflective and thermal state of the urban texture, both at local and global scale, give fundamental information on the surface urban heat island (SUHI) control of the urban planning.In this work, the retrieval of the urban albedo and land surface temperature (LST) from Landsat 7 satellite data is performed over a selected area of a town in Central Italy (Terni), exhibiting a significant urban change during the last 10 years. Comparing two satellite images on 2005 and on 2015, the spatial pattern of albedo and LST shows an average albedo decrease of 0.03 during this period and a daytime SUHI increase of 2.3°C.As highlighted by a focused local scale analysis, built-up area modifications moved towards both a reduction and an increase of the surface albedo, comparing the previous situation of the area and the reflective properties of materials chosen for the new settlements or refurbishments.The proposed analysis with remote sensing data may be considered an effective indicator able to point out if urban changes like interventions and new constructions move towards an urban sustainable development in terms of SUHI mitigation.

Quantitative Analysis of Factors Contributing to Urban Heat Island Intensity

AbstractThis study identifies causative factors of the urban heat island (UHI) and quantifies their relative contributions to the daytime and nighttime UHI intensities using a mesoscale atmospheric model that includes a single-layer urban canopy model. A midlatitude city and summertime conditions are considered. Three main causative factors are identified: anthropogenic heat, impervious surfaces, and three-dimensional (3D) urban geometry. Furthermore, the 3D urban geometry factor is subdivided into three subfactors: additional heat stored in vertical walls, radiation trapping, and wind speed reduction. To separate the contributions of the factors and interactions between the factors, a factor separation analysis is performed. In the daytime, the impervious surfaces contribute most to the UHI intensity. The anthropogenic heat contributes positively to the UHI intensity, whereas the 3D urban geometry contributes negatively. In the nighttime, the anthropogenic heat itself contributes most to the UHI intensity, although it interacts strongly with other factors. The factor that contributes the second most is the impervious-surfaces factor. The 3D urban geometry contributes positively to the nighttime UHI intensity. Among the 3D urban geometry subfactors, the additional heat stored in vertical walls contributes most to both the daytime and nighttime UHI intensities. Extensive sensitivity experiments to anthropogenic heat intensity and urban surface parameters show that the relative importance and ranking order of the contributions are similar to those in the control experiment.

A New Single-Layer Urban Canopy Model for Use in Mesoscale Atmospheric Models

AbstractA new single-layer urban canopy model for use in mesoscale atmospheric models is developed and validated. The urban canopy model represents a built-up area as a street canyon, two facing buildings, and a road. In this model, the two facing walls are divided into sunlit and shaded walls on the basis of solar azimuth angle and canyon orientation, and individual surface temperature and energy budget are calculated for each wall. In addition, for better estimation of turbulent energy exchange within the canyon, a computational fluid dynamics model is employed to incorporate the effects of canyon aspect ratio (height-to-width ratio) and reference wind direction on canyon wind speed. The model contains the essential physical processes occurring in an urban canopy: absorption and reflection of shortwave and longwave radiation, exchanges of turbulent energy and water between surfaces (roof, two facing walls, and road) and adjacent air, and heat transfer by conduction through substrates. The developed urban canopy model is validated using datasets obtained at two urban sites: Marseille, France, and Basel, Switzerland. The model satisfactorily reproduces canyon air temperatures, surface temperatures, net radiation, sensible heat fluxes, latent heat fluxes, and storage heat fluxes for both sites. Extensive experiments are conducted to examine the sensitivities of the urban surface energy balance to meteorological factors and urban surface parameters. The reference wind speed is found to be a more crucial meteorological factor than the reference air temperature in altering urban surface energy balance, especially for weak winds. The urban surface energy balance is most sensitive to the roof albedo among urban surface parameters. The roof fraction, canyon aspect ratio, and ratio of roughness length for momentum to that for heat for the roof play important roles in altering urban surface energy balance.

Continuous sky view factor maps from high resolution urban digital elevation models

CR Climate Research Contact the journal Facebook Twitter RSS Mailing List Subscribe to our mailing list via Mailchimp HomeLatest VolumeAbout the JournalEditorsSpecials CR 42:177-183 (2010) - DOI: https://doi.org/10.3354/cr00882 Continuous sky view factor maps from high resolution urban digital elevation models F. Lindberg*, C. S. B. Grimmond Environmental Monitoring and Modelling Group, Department of Geography, King’s College London, London WC2R 2LS, UK *Email: fredrikl@gvc.gu.se ABSTRACT: This paper presents a new method to calculate sky view factors (SVFs) from high resolution urban digital elevation models using a shadow casting algorithm. By utilizing weighted annuli to derive SVF from hemispherical images, the distance light source positions can be predefined and uniformly spread over the whole hemisphere, whereas another method applies a random set of light source positions with a cosine-weighted distribution of sun altitude angles. The 2 methods have similar results based on a large number of SVF images. However, when comparing variations at pixel level between an image generated using the new method presented in this paper with the image from the random method, anisotropic patterns occur. The absolute mean difference between the 2 methods is 0.002 ranging up to 0.040. The maximum difference can be as much as 0.122. Since SVF is a geometrically derived parameter, the anisotropic errors created by the random method must be considered as significant. KEY WORDS: Urban climate · Urban geometry · Urban surface parameters · Geographical Information Systems · Sky view factor · London Full text in pdf format NextCite this article as: Lindberg F, Grimmond CSB (2010) Continuous sky view factor maps from high resolution urban digital elevation models. Clim Res 42:177-183. https://doi.org/10.3354/cr00882 Export citation RSS - Facebook - Tweet - linkedIn Cited by Published in CR Vol. 42, No. 3. Online publication date: July 20, 2010 Print ISSN: 0936-577X; Online ISSN: 1616-1572 Copyright © 2010 Inter-Research.

Recent Progress on Urban Climate Study in Japan

A review of urban climate studies in Japan since 1980 is presented. First, we describe recent research on an urban heat island. In this section, we focus on the heat island with a scale larger than a single city, heterogeneous temperature distribution in an urban district, and quantitative analysis of the formation mechanism of the heat island using numerical models. We then summarize the interaction between a sea breeze and a heat island. Cloud formation and precipitation over the urban area are also summarized. Furthermore, recent studies on the estimation of urban surface parameters and anthropogenic heat maps are briefly described. Observational studies on the urban canopy layer are also introduced. Some recent studies on urban planning are introduced, focusing on the cooling effect of parks and rivers on the urban temperature. Finally, we conclude the review by describing ongoing work.

Modelling of the annual mean maximum urban heat island using 2D and 3D surface parameters

CR Climate Research Contact the journal Facebook Twitter RSS Mailing List Subscribe to our mailing list via Mailchimp HomeLatest VolumeAbout the JournalEditorsSpecials CR 30:215-226 (2006) - doi:10.3354/cr030215 Modelling of the annual mean maximum urban heat island using 2D and 3D surface parameters János Unger* Department of Climatology and Landscape Ecology, University of Szeged, Egyetem utca 2, 6722 Szeged, Hungary *Email: unger@geo.u-szeged.hu ABSTRACT: The primary aim of this study was to reveal quantitatively what effect urban structure has on the development, magnitude and spatial distribution of the annual mean maximum urban heat island using a selected representative sample area in Szeged, Hungary. In order to quantify what effect urban structure has on the development of the mean urban heat island a relatively new surface parameter (weighted volumetric compactness) was used that characterises the volume, structure and thermodynamical role of buildings. This new parameter was used in conjucntion with other established surface parameters. How the new parameter and other surface parameters can pinpoint the magnitude and structure of the heat island was investigated. The compactness of approximately 11000 buildings in one-third of the town was determined by geoinformatical analysis. A stepwise multiple linear regression model was used to determine to what extent each parameter adds to the annual mean urban heat island intensity. According to the results presented here, the connection between compactness and the annual mean ('all weather') heat island intensity is stronger than with the sky view factor. Using this model-equation, the absolute deviations of the generated heat island (calculated for an independent 1 yr period) remained under 0.5°C throughout almost the entire investigated area of Szeged. The structure of the estimated heat island with its characteristic features showed clear similarities to the real conditions. KEY WORDS: Urban heat island · Urban surface parameters · Weighted volumetric compactness · Geoinformatical methods · Representative sample area · Stratified sampling · Stepwise multiple linear regression model Full text in pdf format PreviousNextExport citation RSS - Facebook - Tweet - linkedIn Cited by Published in CR Vol. 30, No. 3. Online publication date: April 26, 2006 Print ISSN: 0936-577X; Online ISSN: 1616-1572 Copyright © 2006 Inter-Research.

Urban meteorological modelling for nuclear emergency preparedness

The main objectives of the current EU project “Integrated Systems for Forecasting Urban Meteorology, Air Pollution and Population Exposure” (FUMAPEX) are the improvement of meteorological forecasts for urban areas, the connection of numerical weather prediction (NWP) models to urban air pollution and population dose models, the building of improved urban air quality information and forecasting systems, and their application in cities in various European climates. In addition to the forecast of the worst air-pollution episodes in large cities, the potential use of improved weather forecasts for nuclear emergency management in urban areas, in case of hazardous releases from nuclear accidents or terror acts, is considered. Such use of NWP data is tested for the Copenhagen metropolitan area and the Øresund region. The Danish Meteorological Institute (DMI) is running an experimental version of the HIRLAM NWP model over Zealand including the Copenhagen metropolitan area with a horizontal resolution of 1.4 km, thus approaching the city-scale. This involves 1-km resolution physiographic data with implications for the urban surface parameters, e.g. surface fluxes, roughness length and albedo. For the city of Copenhagen, the enhanced high-resolution NWP forecasting will be provided to demonstrate the improved dispersion forecasting capabilities of the Danish nuclear emergency preparedness decision–support system, the Accident Reporting and Guidance Operational System (ARGOS), used by the Danish Emergency Management Agency (DEMA). Recently, ARGOS has been extended with a capability of real-time calculation of regional-scale atmospheric dispersion of radioactive material from accidental releases. This is effectuated through on-line interfacing with the Danish Emergency Response Model of the Atmosphere (DERMA), which is run at DMI. For local-scale modelling of atmospheric dispersion, ARGOS utilises the Local-Scale Model Chain (LSMC), which makes use of high-resolution DMI-HIRLAM NWP model data provided to DEMA by DMI four times a day under operational surveillance and covering Denmark and surroundings. The integration of DERMA in ARGOS is effectuated through automated on-line digital communication and exchange of data. The calculations are carried out in parallel for each NWP model to which DMI has access, thereby providing a mini-ensemble of dispersion forecasts for the emergency management.

A multiple linear statistical model for estimating the mean maximum urban heat island

¶This study examines the spatial and quantitative influence of urban factors on the surface air temperature field of the medium-sized of Szeged, Hungary, using mobile measurements under different weather conditions in the periods of March 1999–February 2000 and April–October 2002. Efforts have been concentrated on the development of the urban heat island (UHI) in its peak development during the diurnal cycle. Tasks included: (1) determination of spatial distribution of mean maximum UHI intensity and some urban surface parameters (built-up and water surface ratios, sky view factor, building height) using the standard Kriging procedure, as well as (2) development of a statistical model in the so-called heating and non-heating seasons using the above mentioned parameters and their areal extensions. In both seasons the spatial distribution of the mean maximum UHI intensity fields had a concentric shape with some local irregularities. The intensity reaches more than 2.1 °C (heating season) and 3.1 °C (non-heating season) in the centre of the city. For both seasons statistical model equations were determined by means of stepwise multiple linear regression analysis. As the measured and calculated mean maximum UHI intensity patterns show, there is a clear connection between the spatial distribution of the urban thermal excess and the examined land-use parameters, so these parameters play an important role in the evolution of the strong UHI intensity field. From the above mentioned parameters the sky-view factor and the building height were the most determining factors which are in line with the urban surface energy balance. Therefore in the future, using our model it will be possible to predict mean maximum UHI intensity in other cities, which have land-use features similar to Szeged.