Determination of the Effect of Urban Forests and Other Green Areas on Surface Temperature in Antalya

Abstract

Climate affects the entire life of humans such as physiological development and characteristics, housing and house structures, food and cloth selections, and distribution on land. It is projected that global climate change would cause important changes in climate parameters in the near future and affect the lives of all organisms on earth directly or indirectly. These changes would cause significant changes in forest area zones. Additionally, global population is rapidly increasing. Naturally, population density is also on the rise. Antalya, with its surface area, witnessed intense population movements to it due to its critical location between the West and East Mediterranean Sea. This situation has changed the city and its land uses drastically. Therefore, urban living conditions have become difficult in Antalya. In the cities, the temperatures are higher than the rural areas due to the rapid population growth and the increase in construction. The forest and other green areas in the city reduce the temperature relatively compared to the places where there is more construction. As a result of the rapid increase in urbanization in the city of Antalya, urban heat islands are formed at many points. The aim of our study is to determine the effect of urban forests and other green areas on the temperature in the city of Antalya. In this context, land use/cover, NDVI analysis, and surface temperature maps were produced with QGIS and ArcGIS software using Landsat-8 OLI and Sentinel-2 satellite images. Machine learning algorithms were used to detect land use/cover. As a result of the research, it has been determined that the surface temperature is high in places where buildings and asphalt surfaces are high, and an urban cold island is formed in the urban forest and other green areas and the temperature is low. The temperature differences were determined to be between 3 and −10 °C. The economical use of natural resources, the preference of genotypes with lower water needs in agriculture and forestry, the inclusion of foresights regarding the process in forestry studies in the management plans, the reduction of hard ground in urban areas, the increase of plant use, and the widespread use of roof and terrace gardens are used as measures. Climate change should be considered toward a healthy forest management plans and sustainability in forestry areas. © Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022.