Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
The Effects of Vegetation Growth
on the Microclimate of Urban Area:
A Case Study of Petaling District
Siti Nor Afzan Buyadi, Wan Mohd Naim Wan Mohd
and Alamah Misni
Abstract It is well known that the surface temperature distribution in the urban
area is significantly warmer than its surrounding suburban areas. This phenomenon
is known as urban heat island (UHI). Vegetations play a vital role to mitigate the
UHI effects especially in regulating high temperature in saturated urban area. This
study attempts to assess the effect of vegetation growth on the surface temperature
distribution of the surrounding areas. The area of study for this research is Petaling
District (i.e. City of Shah Alam, Petaling Jaya and Subang Jaya), Selangor. To
monitor the land use/land cover changes within the study areas, Landsat 5 TM
images of 1991 and 2009 are used. The land use/land cover of the study area is
classified into five major classes i.e. water bodies, high-dense trees, mix-vegeta-
tion, built-up area and open land. Based on the thermal band of Landsat 5 TM, the
land surface temperature maps are derived. Mono-window algorithm is used to
convert digital number to surface temperature. Results from this study have shown
that there are significant land use changes within the study area. This study
demonstrates that rapid urban growth significantly decreased the vegetated area,
hence increased the surface radiant temperature. Although the conversion of green
areas to residential and commercial areas significantly increases the land surface
temperature (LST), matured trees help to mitigate the effects of UHI.
(NDVI)
Land
Keywords Normalized
difference
vegetation
index
surface
temperature (LST)
Urban heat island (UHI)
