A fuzzy path analysis of the impact of urban infrastructure planning on land surface temperature

The urban heat island (UHI) effect is one of the most studied manifestations of urban climate in cities. Understanding the dynamics of UHIs and identifying their relationship with changes in urban landscape and infrastructure is necessary to address tailored adaptation and mitigation policies. This paper aims to explore the effects of urban infrastructures (UI) on land surface temperature (LST) and the energy balance. The land surface temperature is retrieved via the split-windows method. To calculate the urban infrastructure relationships with land surface temperature, the impact of urban infrastructures and urbanization on LST is analyzed using Getis Ord Gi* statistics and Band Collection Statistics (BCS). Fuzzy Path analysis is used to evaluate the coefficient values of each urban infrastructure (green–blue-gray-red) with LST in the case study of Mashhad. Results indicate that (a) urban gray infrastructure (UGRI), urban red infrastructure (URI), and urban blue infrastructure (UBI) have a direct impact on LST, (b) the urban green infrastructure (UGI) can have a diverse impact on LST, (c) among the urban infrastructures, the urban gray infrastructure has the highest and urban red infrastructure has lowest impact on LST. Findings highlight the vital need for contextual policies for UHI mitigation strategies tailored to the urban grey infrastructure. The methodology used in this paper can be evaluated in other cities worldwide.