Cooling Richmond Together: A Guide to Cooler Neighborhoods
by Daniel Klein, guest blogger and Sustainability Coordinator at Richmond’s Office of Sustainability
Hey Richmonders!
Our beautiful city is really feeling the heat these days. The sweltering summer temps we’ve all experienced this past month are not just uncomfortable; they pose a real threat to our health, our infrastructure, and our quality of life.
But there's good news: Richmond’s Office of Sustainability recently released the Richmond Cool Kit – a comprehensive guide for making our city cooler, healthier, and more resilient to extreme heat. It's a collective playbook for city staff and for you – our community members – to apply cooling strategies to your own homes, businesses, and community spaces, building heat resilience across every district.
Why Do We Need Your Help to Cool the City?
As the city implements its own measures to reach our RVAgreen 2050 goals, resident participation on private property is also important in mitigating urban heat islands and extreme heat. The way we build in Richmond and the decisions we make today will impact the future.
Here are two key terms that express what’s happening:
Urban Heat Island Effect: Cities are hotter than rural or suburban areas because concentrated heat from dark asphalt streets, concrete sidewalks, brick buildings, parking lots, and tar rooftops soak up the sun's energy during the day and radiate the heat back into the air at night. This cycle of heat absorption and radiation is made worse in urban areas that lack shade, trees, or green spaces.
Extreme heat is a sustained period of two or more consecutive days with temperatures exceeding 95°F. In the U.S., extreme heat is deadlier than hurricanes, floods, and tornadoes combined, and aggravates existing health conditions like asthma and heart disease. Prolonged exposure can lead to serious heat-related illnesses such as heat exhaustion and heat stroke, especially for high-risk individuals like children and the elderly.
Together, urban heat islands and extreme heat make for a dangerous combination. As the effects of climate change become more pronounced, we should expect an increase in the frequency, intensity, and duration of extreme heat events.
Who’s Most Impacted by Urban Heat and Extreme Heat Events?
Across Richmond’s Northside, Southside, and East End, Black and Brown neighborhoods consistently experience worse heat conditions, and some communities can be up to 20°F hotter than higher-income and white neighborhoods. This is largely caused by a legacy of racist policies ranging from redlining and urban renewal to highway construction and deferred maintenance of street trees. Communities with more heat-trapping buildings and impervious surfaces, as well as fewer trees and green spaces, are especially susceptible to heat risks.
The Solutions
The Richmond Cool Kit offers 25 proven cooling strategies for you to apply in your yard, business, or neighborhood, featuring free and low-cost options alongside more permanent, long-term solutions.
The Cool Kit breaks cooling strategies down into four main categories:
1. Urban Greening: Harnessing the Power of Nature
Nature is our original air conditioner! Urban greening strategies leverage the power of plants to cool our city in several ways, offering numerous benefits beyond just heat mitigation, such as reducing stormwater runoff and mitigating flood risk, providing habitat for insects and wildlife, calming traffic, and improving air quality.
Urban Forestry: When it comes to cooling, trees are superstars in two key ways. Their shade blocks the sun while their leaves release water vapor through evapotranspiration, cooling the surrounding air. Plant the right tree in the right place, with adequate room to grow, and have long-term maintenance plans in place for watering and care.
Green Infrastructure: Rain gardens, bioswales, and permeable pavements reduce flooding and lower temperatures. Convert paved surfaces into permeable pavers to allow rain to seep into the soil, and utilize native plants in underused areas of your lawn as pollinator gardens to help lower temperatures.
Blue Space: Water features, like as fountains and splash pads, offer immediate, localized cooling. They're also fantastic community spaces that provide places for kids to play and parents to relax. Consider adding a small fountain to your yard with seating areas.
2. Shade: Instant Relief, Smart Design
When you can't plant a tree, build some shade! Shade is ideal for patios, decks, playgrounds, and other gathering spaces where natural solutions may not be suitable. Notice where people gather in your yard, business, or community, and install shade solutions to enhance the area.
Light Shade: Quick, adaptable, and often low-cost options like lightweight canopies, patio umbrellas, pop-up tents, and awnings that affix to buildings.
Heavy Shade: Larger, more permanent structures, like gazebos, pavilions, and pergolas, offer robust protection. Solar canopies are ideal for parking lots, since they generate power and shade cars parked underneath.
Shade Walls: Vertical elements, such as trellises with vining plants or "living walls," can block direct sunlight and provide evaporative cooling. This is a great solution in tighter spaces.
3. Smart Surfaces: Reflecting Heat, Saving Energy
Smart surfaces are technologies that reduce heat absorption by reflecting sunlight. In essence, this means using materials and colors that don’t get so hot.
Cool roofs, pavement, and infrastructure: Using light-colored paints and heat-resistant materials for roofs, pavement, and outdoor gathering spaces can significantly reduce temperatures, lower energy bills, and make surfaces cooler to the touch. A cool roof can be up to 50°F cooler than a standard dark roof, and cool pavements can lower temperatures by 50-70°F for driveways, parking lots, and walkways. Resealing paved surfaces with lighter coatings also protects the surface and extends its lifespan.
Solar Photovoltaic (PV) Roofs: Solar panels not only generate clean, renewable energy but also shade the rooftops, further reducing the surface temperature of the building below. It’s a win-win for renewable energy and lowers A/C bills.
Green Roofs: Living roofs covered with drought-resistant plants offer evaporative cooling, reduced stormwater runoff, improved building insulation, and a valuable habitat for pollinators. Some innovative designs even combine solar panels with green roofs!
4. Depaving: Uncovering Cooler Ground
Depaving is exactly what it sounds like: removing impervious surfaces, like asphalt and concrete, and replacing them with greener, cooler alternatives. Could that underused parking lot benefit from some seating, landscaping, and public art? It's about transforming underutilized, heat-trapping spaces into vibrant, functional community assets.
Surface Removal and Replacement: Replacing driveways, roundabouts, and patios with rain gardens, pollinator gardens, or permeable alternatives enables us to create new green spaces and reimagine communal areas.
A Cooler Richmond, Together
The Richmond Cool Kit is more than just a document; it's a call to action. It's about building a city where every Richmonder, regardless of their neighborhood, can thrive in a climate-resilient and climate-neutral community. As Mayor Danny Avula often reminds us, addressing extreme heat is a public health imperative, a chance to right past wrongs, and a commitment to our future generations. The interventions outlined in this kit can directly contribute to better long-term health outcomes and a more equitable Richmond.
Read the full Cool Kit to learn about these different strategies, when and where to apply them, and helpful tips for considering the best approaches for privately-owned spaces. Your participation is key to building a cooler future for all!