Activity-Weighted Assessment and Environmental Drivers of Compound Ozone–Heat Exposure Risk in Urban Outdoor Exercise Spaces

Urban outdoor exercise spaces are important public infrastructures for physical activity, but their users may be exposed to concurrent air pollution and unfavorable thermal environmental conditions. This study developed an activity-weighted framework to assess the compound ozone–heat exposure risk in urban outdoor exercise spaces. Taking the central districts of Beijing as the study area, we integrated the mobile phone signaling-derived visitation frequency, 1 km ground-level O3 estimates, the 30 m Landsat-derived land surface temperature (LST), the land cover composition, road network indicators, and three-dimensional building morphology variables. An activity-weighted compound ozone–heat exposure risk index (COHER) was constructed by combining the normalized daily visitation frequency, monthly mean O3, and area of interest (AOI)-level mean LST. The results showed that the visitation frequency, O3, and LST exhibited mismatched spatial patterns, highlighting the need for compound exposure assessment. COHER values ranged from 0.0000 to 0.1918 and were strongly right-skewed, with 49 outdoor exercise spaces identified as the top 10% high-risk sites. These high-risk spaces had a substantially higher visitation frequency and mean LST than the remaining spaces, whereas O3 differences were small and not statistically significant. Exploratory XGBoost–SHAP analysis suggested that the built-up intensity, building height variability, and potential airflow obstruction were relatively important environmental correlates of COHER. The proposed framework provides a relative place-based screening tool for identifying priority outdoor exercise spaces for exposure-sensitive planning and risk mitigation.

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Publication Details

Journal
Toxics
Published
2026-06-30
DOI
https://doi.org/10.3390/toxics14070581
Primary Topic
Urban Heat Island Mitigation
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
0.00

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article

Activity-Weighted Assessment and Environmental Drivers of Compound Ozone–Heat Exposure Risk in Urban Outdoor Exercise Spaces

Xicheng Zhang, Pengying Du, Lei Yao, Rui Su et al.
Toxics
Urban Heat Island Mitigation
article

Activity-Weighted Assessment and Environmental Drivers of Compound Ozone–Heat Exposure Risk in Urban Outdoor Exercise Spaces

Xicheng Zhang, Pengying Du, Lei Yao, Rui Su, Zhengning Yao, Kailun Zhang
article en

Abstract

Urban outdoor exercise spaces are important public infrastructures for physical activity, but their users may be exposed to concurrent air pollution and unfavorable thermal environmental conditions. This study developed an activity-weighted framework to assess the compound ozone–heat exposure risk in urban outdoor exercise spaces. Taking the central districts of Beijing as the study area, we integrated the mobile phone signaling-derived visitation frequency, 1 km ground-level O3 estimates, the 30 m Landsat-derived land surface temperature (LST), the land cover composition, road network indicators, and three-dimensional building morphology variables. An activity-weighted compound ozone–heat exposure risk index (COHER) was constructed by combining the normalized daily visitation frequency, monthly mean O3, and area of interest (AOI)-level mean LST. The results showed that the visitation frequency, O3, and LST exhibited mismatched spatial patterns, highlighting the need for compound exposure assessment. COHER values ranged from 0.0000 to 0.1918 and were strongly right-skewed, with 49 outdoor exercise spaces identified as the top 10% high-risk sites. These high-risk spaces had a substantially higher visitation frequency and mean LST than the remaining spaces, whereas O3 differences were small and not statistically significant. Exploratory XGBoost–SHAP analysis suggested that the built-up intensity, building height variability, and potential airflow obstruction were relatively important environmental correlates of COHER. The proposed framework provides a relative place-based screening tool for identifying priority outdoor exercise spaces for exposure-sensitive planning and risk mitigation.

ToxicsVol. 14(7)
Ningxia University (CN), Ningxia Medical University (CN), Beijing Sport University (CN)
Ningxia Medical University
Sustainable cities and communities
Openalex Percentile: Top 12%
Urban Heat Island Mitigation
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