I and everyone in the Twitter comments already read it.
And we all agree that it is pure BS.
Also the last I checked, the tree in my backyard and all the greenspaces all over my estate do nothing to stop the sunlight landing on my skin.
Not one person gets sheltered by trees while outdoors in any urban environment.
Also FYI you can actually get hats that block sunlight, sunglasses, sun screen. I already have them all as a low life POC on benefits in social housing.
But ok, I guess I can get on board with what this article is trying to say - GIBE ME FREE AIR CONDITIONING USING HURFDURF'S TAXES NAOW!.
Also feel free to tell me just how many green spaces there are around all the blocks of flats there are in London.
Explain how Africans living in Africa still manage to play sports and train enough to compete in the Olympics under the amount of heat stress there?
How is reporting on a study some sort of extreme left wing bias? or is it that only the people on the extreme left are able to do research?
You don't seem to think about what happens to the sun hitting anything other than your skin.
I'll give you a clue, look up urban heat islands* or urban micro environments, there is a very good reason the less greenery you have the hotter an area is, and why towns are usually hotter than the surrounding green areas, it's something that's been known about for a very long time (IIRC it can be a difference of several degrees centigrade).
Concrete traps heat, even just having a line of trees either side of a road can reduce the heating of the concrete under/around them by a significant degree as it reduces the amount of sun hitting it - you try walking barefoot on concrete that's been fully exposed to the sun vs concrete that's been in shade from a tree on a hot clear day, just remember not to stand for long on the concrete (and possibly have some burn cream handy
). Or you try measuring the temperature of the concrete vs a some soil a few feet away and you'll often notice a difference (especially later in the day/early evening) as concrete retains heat far better.
Air temp might be ~35-40c, the surface temperature of concrete or asphalt might be nearer 70 or 80c** which is why you see asphalt becoming soft/melting in the sun, and the "haze" above road surfaces, and that concrete can retain that heat through much of the night meaning you don't get a chance to cool down at night.
Construction also makes a difference, you can build with a mind to keeping things more comfortable at higher temperatures, but it costs a little more and requires a little more care to be taken, which wasn't a high priority in many cases.
You also don't seem to consider the effect things like humidity has, in many instances it's not the heat that's the killer, it's the humidity as you can be reasonably ok at about 35c if it's a dry heat and you can keep hydrated, 35c at high humidity means your body can't cool itself properly via sweating at which point you start to run into real problems.
It's one of the reasons people might scoff at say the idea that people in the UK have problems at 25-30c because they might live in an area that gets 35-40c, but when they come over they suddenly realise that the reading on the thermometer is not everything.
You mention London in your other post, it's worth noting that London does have a fair bit of green space (even the likes of the tower blocks often had green play areas near them), it's also a city that historically has been a lot cooler than many American ones on average., and many rebuilding projects have had explicit rules about things like including more green spaces both to make it more visually appealing and because it is recognised the difference they make.
*Gliding clubs love being able to plan their flights from one such heat island to another, as they know that there is pretty much always going to be a lovely warm air zone with the resulting updraft above any densely built area.
**IIRC That surface temp is also a large part of the reason White vans became far more popular in the UK than black vans back when the likes of the Ford Transit first took off, the white paint IIRC made a huge difference to the temperature inside the van compared to the black paint, and when you didn't have air conditioning that was important.
