CAPLA Professor Ladd Keith Discusses Urban Heat Islands in Las Vegas Review-Journal Article
Ladd Keith, Assistant Professor of Planning and Sustainable Built Environments
Ladd Keith, assistant professor of planning and chair of the Sustainable Built Environments undergraduate degree program in the College of Architecture, Planning and Landscape Architecture at the University of Arizona, was quoted in a July 10, 2002 Las Vegas Review-Journal article on how "Heat and virus bring a double threat to vulnerable populations."
The article notes how Las Vegas is one of several cities in the Desert Southwest considered to be urban heat islands, causing the city to be hotter than surrounding rural areas. “We’ve known about the urban heat island effect since 1818. It hasn’t been until recently that cities have really started to take an active role in thinking about how they can plan and design differently to mitigate needs,” says Keith in the article. “That we even need cooling centers, it’s the admission that we don’t have quality housing for the majority of our population,” says Keith, who has researched heat islands for the Urban Land Institute.
The article concludes with a list of available cooling stations in Las Vegas.
Keith, who joined CAPLA in 2009, is an interdisciplinary researcher working at the intersection of urban planning and climate science and explores how climate action planning can make more sustainable and resilient cities. He is currently the principal investigator of a NOAA-funded research project evaluating the use of urban heat maps in urban planning and is co-investigator on a project developing community climate profiles tailored to local needs. In addition to founding and leading the Sustainable Built Environments program, Keith teaches public participation and dispute resolution and planning for urban resilience. He contributed to the development and analysis of a number of land use and development regulations, comprehensive plans, hazard mitigation plans and climate action plans and recently completed a full eight-year term on the City of Tucson's Planning Commission.
Header photo by Kevin Schmid, courtesy Pixabay.
