Cities experience the urban heat island effect (UHI), i.e. cities are warmer than the countryside. With climate change and rapid urbanization UHI effects will become more frequent, and better UHI modelling and warning strategies are needed. Urban temperatures vary locally due to the presence of buildings, trees, water bodies that affect the absorbed solar radiation, the wind speed and evapotranspiration. Urban weather models therefore need high resolution urban morphology information like building height, street width, tree positions, building material and reflective properties of roofs, roads and building walls. Recent modelling efforts focused on including urban
morphology, but spatial information about reflective properties of roofs, roads and building walls has been ignored. We use digital technologies to collect Google Streetview images and drone images, and map high-resolution information about reflective properties and to feed them into a weather model for Amsterdam and validate forecasts against field and remote sensing observations.
