Correlation of Land Use and Cover with Meteorological Anomalies

Challenges Associated with Classifying Urban Meteorological Stations: The Oklahoma City Micronet Example

“…For the Auer [33] system, the range of vegetation was limited, which yielded extensive challenges when classifying the OKCNET sites. Previous studies have demonstrated vegetative cover within the urban environment to be a significant contributor to the local energy balance and microclimate [6,19,23,41], and as such, vegetation requires significant emphasis when developing a site classification system.…”

“…Previous studies have demonstrated vegetative cover within the urban environment to be a significant contributor to the local energy balance and microclimate [6,19,23,41], and as such, vegetation requires significant emphasis when developing a site classification system. The Urban Terrain Zone system presented by Ellefsen [30] was an overall improvement over the Auer [33] classification system due to increased details focused on structures within urban areas. However, for sites with little to no structural features, the system failed because it is based solely on building characteristics.…”

“…However, for sites with little to no structural features, the system failed because it is based solely on building characteristics. The Oke [31] system represents vast improvement over Auer [33] and Ellefsen [30] because of the inclusion of specific quantitative values that serve as guidance for the classification of a site, while the Stewart and Oke [34] system further expanded the quantitative structure to specific, neighborhood-scale characteristics. Even so, while the Stewart and Oke [34] system yielded fewer sites that required multiple zone assignments versus the other classification systems, challenges still existed in classifying certain sites using such specific categories.…”

“…For example, Auer [33] developed a qualitative urban classification system based upon "meteorologically oriented" land use and land cover parameters with the goal of keeping the system general enough to be applied to virtually any metropolitan area. Using low-level airborne mapping and photography, the land use and land cover parameters were established for the St. Louis urban area in the mid-seventies.…”

“…Thus, beginning with the original deployment of sensors, supplemental information for each station was collected including site photographs and general geographical information. Using the collected information, each station was classified according to methodologies published by Auer [33], Ellefsen [30], Oke [31], and Stewart and Oke [34]. However, significant classification challenges arose pertaining to a number of sites deployed across Oklahoma City and this study documents the strengths, limitations, and possible needs for future classification schemes focused on urban meteorological stations.…”