Dallas city officials working to map which neighborhoods are hotter than others
DALLAS (CBSNewsTexas.com) — Extreme heat kills more Americans every year than any other weather-related event.
That's why scientists and the City of Dallas are working together on a campaign to map which neighborhoods in the city are hotter than others.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) selected Dallas as one of the 18 communities across the country that will be included in their urban heat island mapping campaign.
"What an urban heat island is, is the fact that cities are typically much warmer than your nearby more vegetative, more rural [areas] due to factors of the built environment," said Morgan Zabow, NOAA's community heat and health information coordinator.
All the city's concrete and buildings trap heat during the day and radiates that heat back out into communities.
"It can really help the city in trying to implement cooling solutions...and maybe help with some policies in trying to address heat too," Zabow said.
"Trees can directly cool us, the most obvious way right is through shading," said Emily Plauche, an urban forestry coordinator with the Texas Trees Foundation.
The foundation has planted an estimated 1.5 million trees since 1982. Last fall, they planted dozens of trees at Foster Elementary School in Dallas.
"School campuses are some of the least tree-d areas in the city, actually," Plauche said. "They have very low canopy cover so coming in and planting trees is gonna be really important to cool the outdoor spaces for students."
She said planting trees is a great way to combat urban heat islands. "Trees really help cool our cities and make them more livable."
In order to accurately map heat across the city, the researchers at NOAA are going to need Dallas residents to help.
"Volunteers from the City of Dallas will go out and collect air temperature data as well as humidity data with a sensor that they either attach to their car or their bike," Zabow explained. "These volunteers will travel around predetermined routes around the city three times during the day...this data is able to produce a report that gives us a map that really outlays, again, the hottest neighborhoods in the city."
Researchers say it's a great way to impact the future of your community.
"If we're starting to take action, and build our cities to be cooler, I think hopefully we'll be OK," Zabow said.
NOAA researchers say they're still looking for volunteers to help out in Dallas on the day of the study, Aug. 5. For more information on how you can sign up, click here.