Green Spaces Growth Impact on the Urban Microclimate

Urban heat island (UHI) is one of the urban climatology problems arising in the urban development. Trees and vegetation play vital role to mitigate UHI effects. This study attempts to assess the effects of vegetation growth on land surface temperature (LST) distribution in urban areas. Green spaces area within the City of Shah Alam, Selangor has been selected as the study area. Land use/land cover and LST maps of two different dates are generated from Landsat 5 TM images of the year 1991 and 2009. Only five major land cover classes are considered in this study. A mono-window algorithm is used to generate the LST maps. Landsat 5 TM images are also used to generate the NDVI maps. Results from this study have shown that there are significant land use changes within the study area. Although the conversion of natural green areas into residential and commercial areas significantly increases the LST, matured trees in urban green space will help to mitigate the effects of UHI and it is important to sustain urban development as well as to provide better quality of life on the urban population.