Spatiotemporal dynamics of urban climate during the wet-dry season transition in a tropical African city

The urban heat island effect has been the focus of several studies concerned with the effects of urbanisation on human and ecosystem health. Humidity, however, remains much less studied, although it is useful for characterising human thermal comfort, the Urban Dryness Island (UDI) effect and vegetation development. Furthermore, microscale climate variability associated with land cover is increasingly crucial for understanding urbanisation effects on the health and wellbeing of living organisms. We used regression analysis to investigate the spatial and temporal dynamics of temperature, humidity and heat index in the tropical African city of Kampala, Uganda. We gathered data during the wet to dry season transition from 22 locations that represent the wide range of urban morphological differences in Kampala. Our analysis showed that the advancement of the dry increased variability of climate in Kampala and that the most built-up locations experienced the most profound seasonal changes in climate. This work stresses the need to account for water availability and humidity to improve our understanding of human and ecosystem health in cities.