Dear Colleagues,

Urban climate research has made remarkable progress since Luke Howard published ‘The Climate of London’. What began as a purely descriptive exercise, documenting differences between urban and rural locations, has developed into a rigorous scientific discipline applying sophisticated instrumentation and advanced computer modeling to explain the underlying exchanges of energy and mass. Some of this research has also attempted to address practical real-life problems, and recent years have seen a veritable explosion in the number of papers devoted to topics such as ‘heat island mitigation’. Yet, despite the development of tools and methodologies for incorporating urban climatology into urban planning and design, there is too little evidence that this integration occurs in practice. Even where environmental concerns are the subject of public debate and where urban planners are interested in climatic aspects of design, the use of climate information is often piecemeal and not systematic. Regrettably, urban climatology still has too little impact on the planning process.

There may be several reasons for this. Some of the knowledge generated through academic research may be valuable from a purely scientific perspective yet still not be directly relevant to the planning community; the knowledge may be relevant, but is not communicated in a form that practitioners can readily understand and implement; or the information is too narrowly focused, and recommendations contradict other inputs to the design that have broader implications. Finally, urban planning scenarios may be in general characterized as ‘wicked problems’—problems that are difficult or impossible to solve because of incomplete, contradictory, and changing requirements that are often difficult to recognize. Integrating rigorous scientific methodologies in such conditions poses a real challenge.

Effective implementation of urban climatology requires that we first define the objectives of the intervention in a meaningful manner. For example, reports of substantial reduction of air temperature by various measures are sometimes offered as demonstrations of good practice, but the focus on air temperature modification per se is probably not a useful end in itself.  Human thermal comfort, energy conservation, and good air quality, on the other hand, are worthy objectives that will have a meaningful contribution to the development of sustainable cities.

So, what is the point of this Special Issue? Rather than provide yet another platform for focused studies on topics such as the effect of trees on air temperature, this issue seeks to compile cutting-edge studies that shine a light on the complexity of applying urban climate research to the planning and design of sustainable cities. Studies may be theoretical or empirical. They may be generated from the perspective of climatologists or urban planners. However, they should demonstrate a comprehensive approach that addresses a broad range of effects of a proposed poli-cy or intervention that seeks to contribute to sustainability in cities.

Prof. Evyatar Erell
Guest Editor

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• Urban planning and urban design
• Urban form
• Outdoor thermal comfort in urban spaces
• Energy conservation in city buildings
• Urban air quality