ULI Urges Mitigating Urban Heat Islands With Gowanus Rezoning

Rezoning anticipated for Gowanus, Brooklyn/ photo courtesy of Fifth Avenue Committee

NEW YORK CITY—The anticipated rezoning of Gowanus, Brooklyn in furtherance of Mayor Bill de Blasio’s housing plans, Housing New York: A Five-Borough, Ten-Year Plan and Housing New York 2.0, will increase development opportunities in the upcoming years.

The Urban Land Institute New York and the Fifth Avenue Committee, a South Brooklyn community non-profit group, organized a technical assistance panel (TAP) of environmental, real estate and transportation experts to study the Gowanus neighborhood. ULI then issued a report, recommending quality-of-life strategies, contemplating increased densification of buildings.

The report focuses on the Urban Heat Islands phenomenon, which occurs when buildings, asphalt and concrete replace plant life; and cars and air conditioners release additional heat into the environment. This heats up urban areas. The US EPA says in a city of a million people, this can increase the temperature 1.8 to 5.4 degrees hotter than its surroundings neighborhoods.

Urban heat islands can prevent cities from cooling off at night, getting up to 22 degrees hotter than neighboring areas. The CDC reports that each summer more than 65,000 people visit the ER for heat illnesses, and that between 2006 and 2015, heat caused the deaths of 1,130 people.