How Do the Multi-Temporal Centroid Trajectories of Urban Heat Island Correspond to Impervious Surface Changes: A Case Study in Wuhan, China

Conspicuous expansion and intensification of impervious surfaces accompanied by rapid urbanization are widely recognized to have exerted evident impacts on the urban thermal environment. Investigating the spatially and temporally varying relationships between Land Surface Temperature (LST) and impervious surfaces (IS) at multiple scales is of great significance for steering IS expansion and intensification. This study proposes an analytical framework to investigate the spatiotemporal variations of LST and its responses to IS in Wuhan, China at both city scale and sub-region scale. The summer LST patterns in 2002–2017 are extracted by Multi-Task Gaussian Process (MTGP) model from raw 8-day synthesized MODerate-resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) LST data. At the city scale, the weighted center of LST (LSTWC) and impervious surface fraction (ISFWC), multi-temporal trajectories and coupling indicators are utilized to comprehensively examine the spatial and temporal dynamics of LST and IS within Wuhan. At the sub-region scale, urban heat island ratio index (URI), impervious surfaces contribution index (ISCI) and sprawl rate are introduced for further quantifying the relationships of LST and IS. The results reveal that IS and hot thermal landscapes expanded by 407.43 km(2) and 255.82 km(2) in Wuhan in 2002–2017 at city scale. The trajectories of LSTWCs and ISFWCs are visually coherent and both heading to southeast direction in general. At the sub-region scale, the specific cardinal directions with the highest ISCI variations are examined to be the exact directions of ISFWC trajectories in 2002–2017. The results reveal that the spatiotemporal variations of LST and IS are highly correlated at both city and sub-region scales within Wuhan, thus testifying the significance of steering IS expansion and renewal for controlling urban thermal environment deterioration.