Analysis of urban heat island phenomenon and mitigation solutions evaluation for Montreal

In this research, we analyze and demonstrate how street vegetation planting, albedo and urban canopy characteristics affect urban climate in a specific Canadian city, Montreal. We use ENVI-met (a three-dimensional computer model which analyzes micro-scale thermal interactions within urban environments) to calculate the sky view factor (SVF) for a 300 m × 300 m section of the city, and simulate the environmental conditions including air temperature (Ta), human weighted mean radiant temperature (MRTh-w), wind speed, and physiologically equivalent temperature (PET) at the community scale. These simulation comparisons demonstrate the effects on each environmental factor for a typical summer day and provide hints for mitigation of the urban heat island (UHI) and new urban development. The effectiveness of each UHI mitigation strategy is evaluated for providing guidelines for policy development.