The heat is here to stay and we need to make room for it

Belgium is reeling under a heatwave. Rooftops are creaking, car hoods are crackling and here and there the asphalt peels up from the road. Sales of air conditioning units are soaring, and weather forecasters, authorities and employers are issuing guidelines on how best to cope with heat stress. Why is it that, time and again, we react as if heat were a temporary state of emergency?

When we talk about heat, it is linked to words such as stress, wave, alarm and extreme. That language betrays the fact that heat takes us by surprise, as something that is still uncharted territory for us. That is hardly surprising. Other weather phenomena – rain and wind – have shaped our traditions, proverbs and sayings over the centuries. And our urban and architectural culture.

In some tropical countries, on hot days like these, they say that ‘the sun has invited her family over’. This poetic expression points to a different meteorological culture and a different perspective on living with heat. Therein also lies the challenge for Belgium. Due to climate change, heatwaves will occur more frequently. This calls for a rethinking of our language, traditions and architectural culture.

Our urban culture of living and working is built on the familiar weather patterns of our region. We invest primarily in two spaces: an indoor space to work and an indoor space to live. But heat demands something different.

Alongside a life indoors, heat also calls for a life outdoors. And that is where the problem lies. The limited public spaces and squares we have created to drain rainwater quickly radiate heat on hot days, well into the night. The small Belgian trees planted there often provide little shade. Our urban architecture, designed with rain in mind, is increasingly at odds with a climate of heat.

If we look at the culture of living and working in Southern Europe or in countries such as Ethiopia or Peru, we see a great deal of ‘third space’. In these public spaces, large squares are bordered by shaded arcades, mature trees provide cool respite along wide avenues, and churches stand open day and night, like cathedrals of coolness. We lack those places where coolness is the norm and where you can linger on hot days without having to consume anything. Public space is shrinking, and solutions to heat stress are becoming increasingly individualised.