Hyper-Local Surface Temperature Measurements at Denver Bus Stops

Steinharter, Logan's study collected 270 Forward-Looking Infrared (FLIR) thermography measurements at 60 bus stops in Denver, Colorado, during summer 2023. The data compares hyper-local surface temperatures with satellite-derived land surface temperatures to evaluate their utility for predicting pedestrian thermal comfort indices.

Use Cases

• Compare hyper-local FLIR surface temperature measurements with 30 m resolution Landsat-derived land surface temperatures to assess spatial resolution discrepancies.
• Model the relationship between FLIR-measured surface temperature and thermal comfort indices like mean radiant temperature, where each 1 °C increase predicted a 0.75 °C rise.
• Analyze the correlation strength between FLIR surface temperature data and thermal comfort indices, which showed strong correlations (r > 0.8).
• Evaluate the performance of linear mixed-effects models using FLIR surface temperature data, which explained 50–66% of the variance in thermal comfort indices.

Strengths

• Includes 270 FLIR thermography measurements collected over 19 dates during summer 2023.
• Data is hyper-local, focusing on 60 specific bus stops in Denver, Colorado, for pedestrian-scale analysis.
• Compares high-resolution (~0.01 m) FLIR data with 30 m resolution satellite data, enabling a direct methodological evaluation.
• FLIR surface temperature measurements showed strong, statistically significant correlations (r > 0.8; p < 0.001) with thermal comfort indices.

Limitations

• Sample size is limited to 60 bus stops in a single city (Denver), restricting geographic generalizability.
• Only a four-day subset (n=33 measurements) of the FLIR data coincides temporally with the available Landsat satellite imagery for direct comparison.
• The dataset's primary focus is on summer conditions, lacking seasonal or annual temperature variation data.

Provenance

Source

Borealis Harvested Dataverse, authored by Steinharter, Logan.

Collection Method

Hyper-local surface temperatures collected via consumer-grade Forward-Looking Infrared (FLIR) thermography; satellite-derived land surface temperatures from Landsat 8 and 9 images.

Time Range

Summer 2023, with measurements over 19 specific dates.

Freshness

Data was collected in summer 2023 and the record was last updated on 2026-01-24.

Geography

60 bus stops in Denver, Colorado, USA.