Exploratory Analysis Investigating Cooling Effect of Urban Green: Evidence from Howrah

Due to the urban heat island (UHI) effect, rapid unplanned urbanization has caused the green cover of Indian cities to deteriorate and raise urban temperatures. Understanding the function of urban green spaces (UGS) in reducing the UHI is crucial given that the population of Indian urban areas is projected to be 800 million people by 2050. To measure the cooling benefits supplied by UGS beyond their bounds, high-resolution Landsat data and data from Google Earth are combined with spatial statistical analysis in this study. The cooling effect is analyzed for the famous botanical garden of the age-old 'Acharya Jagadish Chandra Bose Indian Botanic Garden' in Howrah, India. The result showed a temperature variance of 1.23°C (R2 coefficients of 0.78) until the distance of 400 m beyond the park boundary. This study is set out to explore the changes that took place in the local microclimate of the region near the garden after the super cyclone 'Amphan', that struck the city between May 16th and 21st, 2020, leading to the uprooting of several trees and other damages to the city's infrastructure. The quantification of the local cooling resulted in an increased temperature variance of 3.08 °C, influencing a gradient of 300 m from the periphery of the park in post-cyclonic events. The study thus brings into light the impact of urban green that has a significant cooling impact on its neighborhoods, and the preservation of such large green spaces is appreciated, which would lead to sustainable urban environmental management. The Smart City mission that has talked very little in the domain of urban greening can address this particular study, which shows the immense contribution of urban greens in regulating the localized surface temperature.