London’s risk from rising temperatures

More biodiverse green spaces to create shade and particularly planting that encourages heat resilience. Less cars and vehicles, more restrictions and pedestrianised areas. Make london a green, pedestrianised city. Provide water for animals. More high quality council housing without compromising biodiversity. Access to biodiverse space wild spaces for all Londoners close to their homes. Help people to adopt more sustainable food and travel practices. Regulate motorised bikes and couriers so that they are safer and people have better working conditions as well as minimising pollution from the excess of vehicles. help people afford sustainable organic food boxes with produce from regenerative farming. Find projects that regenerate biodiversity while helping with food poverty. 

The recent heatwaves highlight an urgent need for air conditioning in UK schools. Children in the local primary and secondary schools in Waltham Forest suffered in sweltering classrooms, with polyester uniforms exacerbating the discomfort.

Transport is also a major concern; a 33°C day can feel like 40°C inside a bus, making commutes of up to 45 minutes unhealthy and unsafe for pupils.

As climate change makes extreme heat more common, installing air conditioning is essential to protect children's and adults' health and well-being.

OTHER good ideas are: planting trees on routes, installing a roof over bus stops or canopies over pavements where it is impossible to plant trees for other reasons, with benches for the elderly, pregnant, or little kids to take rest in shade. Mist or water fill-in stations are great ideas, too.

From my perspective, the biggest thing I struggle with during heatwaves in London is getting cool on a budget. It seems like staying cool is only for those who can afford it. For example, while my building has cooling central air, we discovered it's too expensive to have on. Yet having a fan on all night also racks up the electricity bill. If I want to cool off, Hampstead Heath or lidos are great options - but each visit costs money and it all adds up. To get to the beach is an expensive train ride, which is often delayed due to the heat anyways. I feel stuck and hot in London. 

Urban tree planting is a known and effective climate adaptation that would help London adapt to both extreme heat and reduce flood risk. More focus needs to be placed on this. Together with a new UK law that gives a maximum safe working temperature 

Both humans and animals have evolved over thousands of years, which has given us the ability to handle small changes in the Earth's temperature. It's natural for the climate to fluctuate a bit. Instead of worrying too much about these minor shifts, we should focus on more pressing problems. These include protecting people's right to speak freely and making sure our legal systems are fair and unbiased for everyone.

Get in touch with CAB, your local councillors and MP. Planning enforcement and building regs. If its making you ill - consult your GP and put it on the record. 

We need shade or we will overheat. In hot countries, europe, australia and NZ high streets have canopies over the sidewalks and pavements. It protects the shop fronts from heat and is a refuge for shoppers. 
The canopies allow shoppers to walk comfortably between shops and escape the glare of the sun.

Planting is also essential. Trees give shade and lower the temperature of an area. This is in contrast to bare tarmac or concrete, which hold the sun’s heat, and radiate heat back in the evening, elevating the local temperature.

There ought to be greater access to water by way of fountains, water features and sculptures. They lower the local temperature, and allow people and animals to cool off. 
Wildlife suffers in heatwaves, they need a reliable source of water. Watching birds take a bath is amusing and calming. Contact with nature is good for mental health. Overheating  does the opposite.

Also, invest in sun shades and window awnings on domestic windows. In Spain they have proper heavy duty exterior blinds to keep sun and heat out. They also have individual awnings to protect living spaces from direct sun and overheating. 
People must routinely drink more water. They must be made aware that, it is very injurious to health to become dehydrated. It can cause migraines, headaches, blood clots, strokes, dvts and pulmonary embolism among many other things. 
People need to know the correct amount of water to drink, and waiting until they are thirsty means they are already dehydrated

1. Car parks - dark asphalt concrete surfaces absorb huge quantities of heat from direct sunlight, and re-emit at night. All mid-large sized car parks should be shaded PROPERLY with trees (at no more than 7.5m intervals (3 bays) OR with solar panels. This will cool the tarmac to prevent it re-emitting at night, keep cars cool, and the solar option will generate clean sustainable electricity. This is tried and tested in France and many other countries. Shade structures and trees also hide the cars, and their lights at night - so good for dark skies and biodiversity policies - 70% of species are nocturnal.

2. Roads - permeable asphalt has been used on motorways for years. Transition to permeable surfaces in urban streets, to attenuate, reduce surface pooling and flooding, clean (through microbial digestion of hydrocarbons), and cool. Re-thinking street drainage in existing streets has been avoided for decades. We need to put more surface water back into the soil to keep it moist and cool to reduce drought impacts, and even differential settlement of buildings, but mostly for coolth.

3. Street Trees - obviously. But also playground trees, car park trees (see above). Stop shop owners taking priority over street tree placement ("ThE tReEs WiLl HiDe OuR ShOpFrOnt").

4. Shrubs - forgotten layer of shading. Just like trees, they slow rainfall and shade the ground. (Also essential for biodiversity).

5. Roofs - green (planted); reflective (white); or generative - clad with solar panels which can shade roof structures and rooftop plant. 

6. Plug in solar - IF plug-in solar panels were made legal (as in much of Europe) we could generate more electricity to off-set cooling costs, reduce bills, and use them to shade more walls, roofs, balconies and patios with solar panels... without the huge outlay currently required - only big rooftop installations are currently viable, and can't install incrementally

7. Insulation, insulation, insulation - keeps cool in summer (and warm in winter)

More solar panels and planting trees w6ith heavy can3oies would be useful.More safe Spaces in park's 

Cooling sheets made from bamboo but also missting stations at bus stops and ac in business. More water fountains too 

What helped was a cooling mattress topper by a company named Chilli, drinking water, fans with ice in front, keeping curtains and blinds closed and using black out material for both, cold showers. However it was still unbearable. London needs a proactive plan that plants trees along all roads and routes, adds rooftop gardens on all buildings and looks to warmer climates like Colombia that have utilised moss installations on streets and buildings to reduce temperatures by up to 2 degrees Celsius. Aircon is also another obvious answer except for the environmental impact which would need to be offset by solar panels and wind power which requires significant deregulation on private homes and businesses and further oversight on new builds, as I live in a leaseholder block with solar panels but they were not registered by the builder, so we cannot track the benefit of them nor add them to the grid for payment. We also need to regulate the use of glass for high rises as these are much more difficult to regulate temperatures wasting power and exacerbating these issues. Public transport also needs to increase use of aircon as travel in london is excruciating during summer and deregulate electric scooters to encourage other forms of transport. Thanks for your consideration.

what helped me stay cool was drinking a lot of water ! And taking frequent breaks during work. Unfortunately that meant that my productivity went down. It took me longer to earn the same! I am a freelance audiobook narrator, paid by the finished hour.

What London could do is give grants for us to better insulate our homes.

Put water distribution points throughout the city. 
Plant more trees and plants.

Councils well Hounslow in particular need to understand that when planting trees they need to look at why they are planting them and the job expected of them because of climate change not just for decoration . To waste trees and money seems very wasteful ??

At the height of the heatwave only air conditioned spaces made a difference. The heat is pervasive and negatively affects health at home even following all other NHS and govt advice. Introducing planning changes to allow air conditioned spaces at home and in the office is the only realistic way to keep London safe and productive through the summers we are now facing. Nowhere else in the world with regular temperatures and humidity similar to London peaks has any other solution but air con, which needs to be introduced city-wide. Heatpumps could also be a solution, but anything short is insufficient with the summers we now face.

We need to vastly increase the number of trees we are planting to make our streets liveable in future heatwaves, in some areas with worst urban heat island and zero tree canopy the streets will be no go areas!
Planting new street trees can reduce street temperatures by up to 8ºC - this is essential. Scientists estimate that large increases in urban canopy cover could cut summer heat deaths in cities by a third!
It's not fair that leafy areas like Canonbury are several degrees cooler than areas like Newham where the urban heat island effect is fierce.
London’s most at-risk neighbourhoods have the fewest street trees. On many of London's narrow streets, the pavements are too narrow to accommodate street trees - there simply isn't space. The key to increasing tree cover on London’s hottest streets is to look beyond the pavement, to the kerbside.
I want to see more local authorities removing car parking spaces to plant kerbside trees in their place. Widespread reallocation of kerbside for tree planting would help us to adapt to future heat waves and enable people in the most vulnerable neighbourhoods to leave their homes safely. Some boroughs (Camden, Hackney) have planted kerbside trees in build-outs to improve climate resilience, others need to follow suit.

We’ve had four official heatwaves so far this year in London. The mercies are that none were prolonged, and there was no ‘extreme’ (over 35C) heat. 
I was disciplined keeping curtains and windows closed on every hot day during most daylight hours. The downside of less light is more than offset by the lower temperature. 
There is only so much we can do in buildings designed to keep heat in. I recommend moving more slowly and even talking less. It’s hard for us to learn what residents of hotter countries know already, especially if, like me, childhood memories involve a lot of cold and shivering. 
Public buildings and public transport need air conditioning. Arguing against that costs lives. 
I have a portable aircon unit in case of extreme heat. I would have used it on hot days this summer if electricity were cheaper. People on low incomes can’t afford aircon or even electricity for fans on all day. The high price of energy, also for warmth in winter, is a public health issue. The government seems utterly indifferent to the cost of living crisis, which kills. It is a political choice to not strain every sinew to lower energy prices. 
Showers and baths several times a day on hot days help. Water and energy prices make that impossible for millions in Britain. 
Trees are important, and many are being planted, more please!
We need more outdoor swimming places. There used to be many lidos. They need to return..

As long as the political choice is made to protect the wealthy, and to allow everyone else to get worse off, none of these issues will be solved. Housing costs, energy prices and food prices all need attention. We have government of the rich, for the rich, by the rich. If that ever changed, we would all benefit. 

There should be provisions for if it reaches past a certain temperature like in Germany. Once over a certain heat, schools and places of work are closed. This also might give big corporations the kick they need to take more action against the climate crisis 

I have two main concerns. One this survey seems to focus not on resolving the core issues of heatwaves in London but my just making life 5% more bareable during one. Surely the focus should be on reducing the temperature?
Secondly, heatwaves are generally followed by heavy rains causing flash flooding, which London has seen plenty of recently. The annual summer letter for basement flats that I receive to prepare for flooding is useless. A heatwave plan needs to acknowledge the secondary impacts such as scorched earth causing excess run off and flooding, and provide actual assistance to homes at risk. It is honestly my biggest worry during heatwaves.