How a "Cool Block" in One Massachusetts City Could Provide a Template for Combatting Extreme Heat

How a “cool block” near Boston could provide a template for combatting extreme heat

Boston — For Arwa Ait-Chaib and her mother, Wafa El Hidar, summertime in Chelsea, Massachusetts, means trying to beat the heat.  “There are always some days that I feel like we live in the middle of the Sahara desert,”  Ait-Chaib told CBS News.   Their Chelsea neighborhood, located just across the river from Boston, offers little shade. “We had no trees over here at all,” El Hidar said.   Chelsea is plagued by what is known as the Urban Heat Isl…

How a "cool block" in one Massachusetts city could provide a template for combatting extreme heat

Chelsea, Massachusetts, is plagued by what is known as the Urban Heat Island effect, in which pavement and vehicles soak up and radiate heat.