Conference Agenda

Rising urban temperatures and densification demand strategic, context-sensitive responses. In partnership with the Hessian Ministry of Economics, Energy, Transport, Housing and Rural Areas (HMWVW), we developed a participatory, data-driven methodology on a 100 m grid that progresses through four stages.

Step 1: Identification of Universal Hot and Cold Spots. We identified persistent thermal extremes across Hesse using harmonized temperature metrics over a decade. This allowed us to distinguish universal hot and cold spots, which are not only statistically robust but also spatially consistent across day and night as well as heat stress and energy balance.

Step 2: Prioritization of Spatial Action Needs. To define where action is most urgently needed, we introduced a scoring system incorporating multiple dimensions: population density, presence of vulnerable facilities, local ventilation potential, temperature balance in the surrounding neighborhood, and the intensity of local heat or cold extremes.

Step 3: Assessment of Local Potentials and Deficits Using Urban Structure Types. To inform tailored interventions, each grid cell’s potential for climate mitigation was evaluated relative to its structural context. Using high-resolution land cover segmentation (20 cm) and NDVI data, we quantified the degree to which a cell either contributes to or buffers against local heat stress. Crucially, these values were not assessed in isolation but benchmarked against other grid cells within the same urban structure type. This typology-sensitive lens ensures that interventions are both equitable and efficient.

Step 4: Mapping the Suitability of Mitigation Measures. Finally, we assessed the spatial suitability of six key mitigation strategies: green roofs, green facades, unsealing, vegetative shading, artificial shading, and vegetation health improvements. For each 100 m cell, suitability was derived from both physical characteristics and urban geometry. While conceptual guidelines for these interventions exist, our work moves toward spatially explicit implementation maps—bridging the gap between observation and action. By integrating multi-source data and structural typologies into a spatial decision-support tool, this project enables informed and site-specific climate adaptation planning for Hesse.

Cities are experiencing extreme temperatures that exceed 50°C, resulting in severe consequences for biophilic conditions and a rise in mortality rates. The prevalence of impervious surfaces in urban environments disrupts natural energy flows and exacerbates Urban Heat Island (UHI) intensity. Delhi, with its rapidly urbanizing landscape and dense population (97.5% urban dwellers), is increasingly vulnerable to rising urban heat stress, particularly in the face of climate extremes. Therefore, the spatial dynamics of land surface temperature in conjunction with the morphological characteristics of the city were evaluated using the satellite-based remote sensing datasets. The study assessed differential UHI among the built-up and natural cover classes to estimate the role of natural landscapes in regulating Land Surface Temperature (LST) in different local climate zones (LCZ) utilizing long-term MODIS-based LST daytime and nighttime datasets. The differential UHI intensities were observed to be remarkably high in compact low-rise (1.8°C), compact mid-rise (1.7°C) in summer nighttime, followed by compact mid-rise (4.2°C), open lowrise (4.1°C), and heavy industry (3.6°C) in summer daytime.

Considering the rising surface heat stress, ecological infrastructure dynamics, urban morphological setup, and the green cover quality, the ecological hazard risk assessment has been performed using a multicriteria decision-making model known as Fuzzy Analytic Hierarchy Process (FAHP) to identify the major hotspot of ecological concern. The study identified the ecologically fragile regions in the central northwest and east parts of Delhi, dominated by compact built-up clusters showing high LST, which reflects higher heat absorption capacity, reduced evaporative cooling, and increased health risks. The uneven distribution of green cover results in disparities in exposure to heat stress, with low-income areas in the northern, eastern, and western parts of the capital city suffering more with limited access to cooling infrastructure and healthcare. The findings highlight the importance of incorporating green infrastructure into urban planning to mitigate the adverse effects of urban heat stress and ecological fragility. The study strongly advocates for site-specific strategies by proposing a combination of nature-based solutions: green roofs, green walls, avenue plantations, parks, orchards, and green belts. Emphasizing native, heat-tolerant species like Alstonia scholaris, Ficus religiosa, and Monoon longifolium, these solutions are scalable and adaptable to urban centers. The present study emphasizes the development of healthy cities by ensuring universal access to safe, inclusive, accessible, green, and public spaces as per Sustainable Development Goal 11.5.

As a consequence of anthropogenic climate change, heatwaves are becoming more frequent and prolonged worldwide. This creates unprecedented challenges to cities, where the Urban Heat Island effect amplifies the negative impacts of heat on public health, urban well-being, education, labor productivity and critical infrastructure. However, current urban climate mitigation plans often overlook dwellers’ behavioural responses to thermal stress alongside their daily activities. To address this gap, our study uses anonymized mobile phone data to analyze daily occupancy patterns and relative attractiveness during heatwave events at key urban leisure facilities, focusing on the city of Zurich as our study case. For this, we categorize leisure spaces into grey (shopping centers with seasonal active cooling), green (public parks and gardens), and blue (natural or artificial bathing sites) infrastructure. By comparing daily visitor numbers during heatwave days with long-term city-wide occupancy trends, we identify which facilities attract more visitors than expected under thermal stress. Our analysis reveals that bathing sites serve as primary heat retreat destinations in Zurich: when maximum daily temperatures exceed 30°C, bathing sites record 1.5 times more attractive days compared to parks, and 2.5 times more than shopping areas. To understand the spatial drivers of this behavior, we apply a spatially explicit explainable machine learning model. This approach captures complex, nonlinear, and threshold relationships between heat-related visitation patterns and urban spatial features. The results show that attractiveness to heat retreat areas is significantly influenced by longer waterfronts and distance from commercial centers, with areas located more than 2 km from such centers being particularly attractive. Our findings highlight the value of integrating urban big data for heat retreat areas allocation, which provides an evidence-based approach for informing adaptive urban design.

Chennai is the 4th largest urban agglomeration in India, with approx. 12 million inhabitants in the Chennai metropolitan area. Consequences of the rapid growth since the mid-1990s are witnessed in large scale land conversions often of agricultural land and water bodies, therefore aggravating climate change and disaster risks such as water scarcity and flooding, as well as food risks as observed during the pandemic. Governance of the region is equally changing dynamically, with the city and state governments currently formulating the third masterplan. Since the early 2000s, Chennai has witnessed a “millet revolution”, a synonym used for numerous citizens initiatives to introduce organic food and promote ‘non-conventional farming’ and gardening. However, no strategic interventions have taken place such as integrating agroecology in the masterplan, or a regional food council or policy, even though there are multiple benefits of putting (peri)urban farming and gardening on the agenda. This paper brings together multi-year research on periurbanisation processes in the Chennai metropolitan region based on a bioregional definition of the periurban space. We elaborate on the intersection of an envisaged agroecology development pathway that highlights the land-water-food nexus. The authors are currently actively involved in several action research projects that support the implementation of such an agroecological development pathway.