Ladd Keith

Associate Professor of Planning
Faculty Research Associate, Udall Center for Studies in Public Policy

Programs

  • School of Landscape Architecture and Planning
  • Sustainable Built Environments
  • Urban Planning
Ladd Keith, Associate Professor of Planning and Sustainable Built Environments

Cannon/Douglass House

Areas of Expertise

  • Climate action planning
  • Climate change
  • Extreme heat
  • Urban planning

Degrees

  • PhD in Arid Lands Resource Sciences, The University of Arizona
  • MS in Planning, The University of Arizona
  • BA in Media Arts, The University of Arizona

Biography

Ladd Keith, Ph.D., is an associate professor in the School of Landscape Architecture and Planning and a faculty research associate at the Udall Center for Studies in Public Policy at the University of Arizona. His transdisciplinary research focuses on heat planning, policy, and governance to help increase the heat resilience of communities, regions, and nations across the world. He is the UA lead of the Southwest Urban Corridor Integrated Field Laboratory (SW-IFL) funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, the co-lead of the Center for Heat Resilient Communities funded by the U.S. National Integrated Heat Health Information System (NIHHIS), the heat research lead of the Climate Assessment for the Southwest (CLIMAS) funded by the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, co-investigator of the Building Resilience Against Climate Effects (BRACE) funded by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and co-investigator of the Southwest Center on Resilience for Climate Change and Health (SCORCH) funded by the U.S. National Institutes of Health. He also serves on the Management Committee for the Global Heat Health Information Network (GHHIN), a World Health Organization and World Meteorological Organization joint initiative to protect global populations from the health risks of extreme heat. He has a Ph.D. in Arid Lands Resource Sciences and an M.S. in Planning from the University of Arizona.

Selected Interviews and Coverage

Journal Article Publications

  • Jensen, Lauren, Ladd Keith, Sara Meerow, Philip Berke, Erika Schmidt, and Shaylynn Trego. (Accepted, in publication). Planning to Mitigate Heat in Vulnerable Neighborhoods: Applying the Plan Integration for Resilience Scorecard™ for Heat in Two Boston Neighborhoods. Cityscape.
  • Watkins, Lance, Heidi E. Brown, Ladd Keith, Erika Austhof, Hsini Lin Cox, Samuel N. Chambers, Joseph Tabor, Aaron Gettel, and Melissa Guardaro. (Accepted, in publication). A co-produced workflow for addressing inequities in cooling center access. Community Science. https://doi.org/10.1029/2023CSJ000038
  • Trego, Shaylynn, Sara Meerow, Ladd Keith, and David M. Hondula. (Accepted, in publication). Heat mitigation and management in the City of Phoenix, AZ: A case study of America’s hottest large city. Cityscape.
  • Roy, Malini, Ladd Keith, Mona Arora, Fatima Luna, and Julie Robinson. (2024). Coproducing Opportunities to Advance Extreme Heat Resilience in Southern Arizona. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society. https://doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-D-24-0216.1
  • Amaripadath, Deepak, Alamin Molla, Ladd Keith, and David J. Sailor. (2024). Multi-criteria decision support framework for outdoor heat stress management in urban environments in changing climates. Sustainable Cities and Society. 114(1), 105799. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scs.2024.105799
  • Meerow, Sara and Ladd Keith. (2024). Cities at the Forefront of Emerging U.S. Heat Governance. One Earth. 7(8), 1330-1334. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.oneear.2024.07.013
  • Meerow, Sara, Ladd Keith, Malini Roy, and Shaylynn Trego. (2024). Plan evaluation for heat resilience: Complementary methods to comprehensively assess heat planning in Tempe and Tucson, Arizona. Environmental Research Letters. 19(8), 084050. https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ad5d05 
  • Iuliano, Joseph E. and Ladd Keith. (2024). Shifting Gears: A case study of bicycle planning and decision-making in Tucson, Arizona. Active Travel Studies. 4(1). https://doi.org/10.16997/ats.1506
  • Keith, Ladd, Sara Meerow, Lauren Jensen, Shaylynn Trego, Erika Schmidt, and Philip Berke. (2023). Evaluating urban heat mitigation across networks of plans. Journal of Planning Education and Research. https://doi.org/10.1177/0739456X231215780
  • Trego, Shaylynn, Sara Meerow, and Ladd Keith. (2023). Heat planning in small and medium-sized cities: A Collaborative application of PIRS™ for Heat in Kent, WA, USA. Socio-Ecological Practice Research. (5)4, 409-422. https://doi.org/10.1007/s42532-023-00166-6
  • Keith, Ladd, C.J. Gabbe, and Erika Schmidt. (2023). Urban Heat Governance: Examining the Role of Urban Planning. Journal of Environmental Policy and Planning. 25(5), 642-662. https://doi.org/10.1080/1523908X.2023.2244446
  • Chambers, Samuel N., Heidi E. Brown, Ladd Keith, and Erika Austhof. (2023). Development of a Geographic Human Heat Balance Equation to Support Public Health Analyses: An Arizona Urban Sun Corridor application. Remote Sensing Applications: Society and Environment. 32(2023), 101009. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rsase.2023.101009
  • Chambers, Samuel N., Geoffrey A. Boyce, Daniel E. Martinez, Coen Bongers, and Ladd Keith. (2023). The contribution of physical exertion to heat-related illness and death in the Arizona borderlands. Spatial and Spatio-temporal Epidemiology. 46(2023), 100590. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sste.2023.100590
  • Sami, Ida and Ladd Keith. (2023). How do streetcar transit users and streetcar decision-makers perceive heat risk? Journal of Public Transportation. 25(2023), 100045. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jpubtr.2023.100045
  • Hughes, Halley B., David D. Breshears, Kimberly J. Cook, Ladd Keith, and Joseph R. Burger. (2023). Household energy use response to extreme heat evaluated with a biophysical model of temperature regulation: An Arizona case study. PLOS Climate. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pclm.0000110
  • Crisman, Jonathan Jae-An, Ladd Keith, Ida Sami, and Gregg M. Garfin. (2023) Designing Chill City: An interactive game supporting public learning about urban planning for extreme heat. The Journal of Environmental Education. 54(3), 225-239. https://doi.org/10.1080/00958964.2023.2183173
  • Iuliano, Joseph E. and Ladd Keith. (2022). Near Misses and Split Routes: Comparing Rider Behavior, Driver Interaction, and Route Choice for Cyclists. Journal of Transportation Safety & Security. 15(11), 1148-1171. https://doi.org/10.1080/19439962.2022.2155745
  • Brown, Heidi E., Ladd Keith, Valerie Madera-Garcia*, Anissa Taylor, Nicholas M. Ramirez, and Irene Ogata. (2022). Greening up for mosquitoes: A comparison of green stormwater infrastructure in a semi-arid region. Journal of the American Mosquito Control Association. 38(2), 109-112. https://doi.org/10.2987/21-7055
  • Meerow, Sara and Ladd Keith. (2022). Planning for extreme heat: A national survey of U.S. planners. Journal of the American Planning Association. 88(3), 319-334. https://doi.org/10.1080/01944363.2021.1977682
  • Keith, Ladd, Sara Meerow, David M. Hondula, V. Kelly Turner, and James C. Arnott. (2021). Deploy heat officers, policies and metrics. Nature. 598(7879), 29-31. https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-021-02677-2
  • Keith, Ladd, Nicole Iroz-Elardo, Erika Austhof, Ida Sami, and Mona Arora. (2021). Extreme Heat at Outdoor COVID-19 Vaccination Sites. Journal of Climate Change and Health. 4(2021), 100043. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.joclim.2021.100043
  • Keith, Ladd, Sara Meerow, and Tess Wagner. (2020). Planning for extreme heat: A review. Journal of Extreme Events. 6(3&4), 2050003. http://dx.doi.org/10.1142/S2345737620500037
  • Austhof, Erika, Vjollca Berisha, Ben McMahan, Gigi Owen, Ladd Keith, Matthew Roach, and Heidi E. Brown. (2020). Participation and Engagement of Public Health Stakeholders in Climate and Health Adaptation. Atmosphere, 11(3), 265. https://doi.org/10.3390/atmos11030265

Selected Other Publications

News, Research and Projects

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Hot sun over city

We're at a 'heat-shed moment,' researcher Ladd Keith says of University's world-class heat expertise

Ladd Keith, associate professor in the School of Landscape Architecture and Planning, explains what heat governance is and why the University of Arizona may be at a "heat-shed moment" for heat research – uniquely positioned to be a leading institution.

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Ladd Keith moderating a break out discussion during the 2024 Southern Arizona Heat Summit

City of Tucson Adopts Comprehensive Heat Action Roadmap with UArizona Collaboration

Collaborative efforts from City of Tucson leadership and staff, community stakeholders, and University of Arizona faculty to address escalating heat challenges have resulted in the adoption of a newly crafted Heat Action Roadmap and Heat Protection Ordinance for city workers and contractors.