Analysis of the relationship between urban landscape patterns and thermal environment: a case study of Zhengzhou City, China

With the acceleration of urbanization, the heat island effect, as a prominent feature of urban climate, has attracted more attention. Differences in urban landscape patterns have an essential impact on the urban thermal environment. The objective of the study is to examine the impact of urban landscape types and patterns on surface temperature. Taking Zhengzhou City, China, as an example, using Google Earth remote sensing images, an urban landscape type map was created, and landscape indices were calculated. The land surface temperature (LST) of the study area was retrieved by the Landsat-8 thermal infrared band. Correlation analysis indicated that the relationships between urban landscape patterns and the thermal environment were as follows: (i) The scale indices (percentage of landscape (PLAND), largest patch index (LPI), edge density (ED), patch density (PD)) of urban landscape types with cooling effect (water body, riverfront area, park, high-rise building) were significantly negative correlated with mean LST of each partition. (ii) Conversely, there were significant positive correlations between the PLAND and LPI of landscape types with warming effect (block, development land, railway land) and the LST of the partition. (iii) The DIVISION index of the four kinds of landscapes with cooling effect was highly positively correlated with LST, and the DIVISION and SPLIT indices of the three kinds of landscapes with warming effect displayed a remarkable negative relationship with LST. Therefore, under the condition of scale control, integrated distribution of landscape with cooling effect, scattered distribution of landscape with warming effect, and reduced connectivity of landscape with warming effect will contribute to effectively alleviating the formation of urban heat islands.