There's all these poles everywhere that I think are supposed to resemble an estuary or something. Just string some shade sails up already! Also don't surface the whole playground in plastic turf that heats over 140° in the sun

The wet bulb globe temperature (WBGT), the gold standard of heat stress, was around 88°F, which meant playground users could suffer heat illness in after 20 minutes of play. Indeed, the day campers I saw there all left after about ten minutes www.weather.gov/tsa/wbgt

Even though this playground is right on the Hudson River and cool breezes are rolling in, I recorded air temperatures this afternoon around 96° which were way higher than New York City’s projected high today of 87°

Once again, shame on OLIN, Hudson River Park Trust, and everyone else involved in Pier 26 at Hudson River Park, a new waterfront playground that isn’t just hotter than the rest of the neighborhood but basically unusable on days like today, unless you're hiding under the play equipment, in the shade

And it pairs well with the recent Blackbird Spyplane about dressing well when it's too hot — spoiler alert, excessive AC isn't the answer open.substack.com/pub/blackbir...

This is why cities need old tenements and rusty awnings. Hard surfaces can reach extreme temperatures when exposed to the sun, while shaded hard surfaces stay dramatically cooler. This is the effect of sun and shade in one image. Hard surfaces absorb and radiate heat, while shade reduces it.

CPRA’s not dead, long live CPRA. Another great entry in the mayor’s race drama courtesy of the muckrakers at @lamaterial.bsky.social lamaterial.com/p/raman-pass...

That may be true, and Parks should invest more regularly in shade structures until trees grow in, but I think the real problem is that there are hardly any trees on this playground to begin with. Here's the tree map of Pier 42 compared to the tree maps of nearby Seward Park and Corlears Hook

If only there was something the designers could have done to make that weather more bearable! This is Seward Park, a mile away and 100 years older. Air temperature is 93 degrees, heat index is 97, and WBGT is 80 degrees — perfectly safe for outdoor play, with water and rest

And here the wet bulb globe temperature (WBGT) — widely considered the gold standard of measuring heat stress — is just below 95° which means no outdoor activity should be allowed at all, even for the fittest US Army recruits, much less a kid koreystringer.institute.uconn.edu/wet-bulb-glo...

The heat index is 129° which according to NWS signals “extreme danger” and “heat stroke highly likely” www.weather.gov/ama/heatindex

Even though we’re right on the East River, and you’d think there’d be some cooling breezes, the air temperature in this playground is 100 degrees, which is actually higher than the current neighborhood temperature of 95° per NYC Micronet www.nysmesonet.org/networks/nyc

Shame on @nycparks.bsky.social, Mathews Nielsen, and everyone else involved with designing this new playground at Pier 42 in East River Park, an unshaded plastic monstrosity that’s not just hotter than the rest of the neighborhood but dangerous for everyone on hot days like this

87 degrees in New York City. Tell me again why we need to get rid of sidewalk scaffolding, or as I call it, Hudson porticoes

Something I’m wrestling with: The trend of cities reclaiming spaces under highways and overpasses as urban parks and trails. Smart? Opportunistic? Environmentally sketchy? A realistic response to how hard it is to build new green space? Curious if there are good articles or studies on this.

Someone should translate Go Dog Go into Dutch and Danish

Passeggiare all'ombra dei portici del Lower East Side

Los Angelenos! I'm in town tomorrow (Thursday 7/31) to talk shade at Skylight Books. Please come through, I'd love to see your beautiful face nodding appreciatively and hear your tough questions! www.skylightbooks.com/event/skylig...

Same goes for the Italian arcade or portico, which survives in Venice Beach — this can be far more durable and lasting than a tree. It makes a lot of sense in a dry climate — plus, developers could build right on top of it, so maybe there's an opportunity for something like a density bonus

I'd love to see L.A. planners encourage developers to cover the sidewalks again, which is an old Spanish tradition that came over to L.A. and much of the Southwest. Here's what that looked like in the late 19th century — look at how common these public porches were around the plaza

Beyond parody

...or a DIY hack for people who live in poorly insulated homes. Pursuant to Biden's environmental justice initiative, heat scientists at LBNL did some research into this and recommended these off-the-shelf solutions: buildings.lbl.gov/publications...

But that market never developed here, so exterior shades are basically either a high-end amenity for the wealthy — like, for instance, these automated venetian blinds on Ardie Tavangarian's notorious mega-mansion in Bel-Air...