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Urban Planners Looking To Standardize Heat Maps

It only recently became spring, but triple-digit temperatures aren’t all that far off in the Phoenix area. And, as cities and residents start planning for that heat, some of them will turn to heat maps, which track which parts of a city are hotter than others.

Ladd Keith is a planning faculty member at the University of Arizona, where he studies how southwestern cities are planning for climate change.

He says researchers have known about urban heat maps for a while, but they’re still an emerging topic in the area of urban planning. And that, he says, means there are a lot of different technologies being used to measure heat across cities, which in turn means there isn’t one standard heat map everyone can look at.

But is there an effort to standardize them? Keith joined The Show to discuss.

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Mark Brodie is a co-host of The Show, KJZZ’s locally produced news magazine. Since starting at KJZZ in 2002, Brodie has been a host, reporter and producer, including several years covering the Arizona Legislature, based at the Capitol.