Chicago plans for hotter summers

Adaptating to climate change

Alan Halter, May 31, 11.

Climatologists are warning that Chicago’s climate is heating up and they will experience summer temperatures comparable to the Deep South, so Chicago’s planners are beginning to prepare for climate change, according to a recent story in the New York Times.

Adaptation strategies set forth in the Chicago Climate Action Plan call for increased management of heat and flooding through innovative green planning and design methods. Such methods include cooling urban hot spots by encouraging more green landscapes and through energy efficiency improvements. Much of Chicago’s adaptation efforts involve changing street infrastructure in order to decrease temperatures and mitigate flooding.

According to Janet L. Attarian, a director of streetscapes at Chicago’s Department of Transportation, “cities are hard spaces that trap water and heat, and alleys and streets account for 25 percent of groundcover” which causes excessive water runoff leading to floods. Future streetscape designs call for permeable pavements to allow rainwater to filter through to the ground underneath, water storage tanks to capture unabsorbed water along streets, and drought resistant plants to soak up excess water that would otherwise be lost to runoff.

Chicago is getting ready for a wetter, steamier future. Public alleyways are being repaved with materials that are permeable to water. The white oak, the state tree of Illinois, has been banned from city planting lists, and swamp oaks and sweet gum trees from the South have been given new priority. Thermal radar is being used to map the city’s hottest spots, which are then targets for pavement removal and the addition of vegetation to roofs. And air-conditioners are being considered for all 750 public schools, which until now have been heated but rarely cooled.

(Via Planetizen)