Landscape and Urban Planning 226 (2022) 104498

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Landscape and Urban Planning

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/landurbplan

Research Paper

Mapping the link between outdoor water footprint and social vulnerability
in Metro Phoenix, AZ (USA)
Jacob Napieralski *, Catherine Sulich, Audrey Taylor, Paul Draus
University of Michigan-Dearborn, Department of Natural Sciences, 4901 Evergreen Road, Dearborn, MI 48128, USA

H I G H L I G H T S

• Communities that are socially vulnerable exhibit less blueness and greenness.
• Outdoor surface water footprint decreases as vulnerability increases.
• Historically redlined neighborhoods show fewer pools, surface water, and greenness.
• Socially vulnerable communities have higher severity of urban heat island effect.

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Outdoor surface water inequities are the disproportionate distribution of outdoor water for the management of
Residential swimming pools blue and green space, including residential swimming pools and irrigated gardens, and contribute to thermal
Surface water inequity inequities that are particularly pervasive in arid climates. The purpose of this study was to map and assess social
Social vulnerability
vulnerability to green space and blue space within two transects in metro Phoenix, Arizona, a socioeconomically
Urban heat island effect
Redlined communities
diverse city that is water vulnerable and experiences intense urban heating. The objectives were to (1) map
distribution of residential swimming pools; (2) link blueness and greenness of communities to social vulnera­
bility; (3) evaluate the blueness and greenness of formerly redlined neighborhoods by the Home Owners’ Loan
Corporation (HOLC); and (4) assess the severity of the urban heat island effect in redlined neighborhoods. The
results show a strong relationship between social vulnerability and pool count and area, and overall greenness
and blueness. Redlined neighborhoods have fewer pools, surface water features, and vegetation and, as a result,
exhibit a greater severity of urban heat island effect than those graded as “safe”. In many cities like Phoenix, the
legacy of segregative housing policies and the widening gap in socioeconomic vulnerability has amplified the
disparate distribution and access to green and blue urbanscapes.

1. Introduction
Outdoor water inequities, or the disproportionate access to the
benefits of natural and human-made outdoor water and irrigated fea­
tures, are similar to thermal inequities, as both are “place specific and
context dependent manifesting differently based on built environment and
socioeconomic characteristics” (Byrne et al., 2016; p16). While thermal
inequities have recently gained more attention in urban research (e.g.,
Heaviside et al., 2017; Gamble et al., 2018; Mitchell & Chakraborty,
2018; Fan & Sengupta, 2021; Gabbe & Pierce, 2020; Wilson, 2020;
Dialesandro, Brazil, Wheeler, & Abunnasr, 2021; Karanja & Kiage, 2021;
Tuholske et al., 2021), outdoor water inequities have been less explored
in academic literature, even though the presence of surface water can
reduce enhanced urban heat island (UHI) effects and, as a result, heat-
related impacts (e.g., (Gober et al., 2009). Unfortunately, in rapidly
sprawling metropolitan areas in arid climates, water access and con­
sumption are not always viewed as a human right but rather is associ­
ated with social standing, especially when driven by outdoor water
usage. This is particularly true with irrigated gardens and residential
swimming pools - positional goods associated with wealth (Hirsch,
1976). Pools can create cooler microclimates that mitigate UHI effects in
an attempt to make inhospitable desert conditions tolerable and even
comfortable (Larson, Casagrande, Harlan, & Yabiku, 2009).
There are several factors influencing the disproportionate

* Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: jnapiera@umich.edu (J. Napieralski), casulich@umich.edu (C. Sulich), audstay@umich.edu (A. Taylor), draus@umich.edu (P. Draus).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.landurbplan.2022.104498
Received 29 October 2021; Received in revised form 2 June 2022; Accepted 6 June 2022
Available online 10 June 2022
0169-2046/© 2022 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-
nc-nd/4.0/).
J. Napieralski et al. Landscape and Urban Planning 226 (2022) 104498

consumption of outdoor water that are key to this study. Residential due to evaporation rates that outpace precipitation rates, splash losses,
swimming pools epitomize human domination of water, as they are and pool filter backwash (see summary in Table 1).
“artificial creations of determined conditions impossible to achieve in open A lack of vegetative cover and surface water, such as residential
water” (Vidal, Domene, & Saurí, 2011) and are commonly associated swimming pools, is a tangible indicator of social disparity that translates
with large lots and irrigated landscapes (Domene & Saurí, 2006; Rico- into place-specific degradation of property value (Siriwardena, Boyle,
Amoros, Olcina-Cantos, & Saurí, 2009; Vidal et al., 2011; Wentz & Holmes, & Wiseman, 2016) and public health (Nardone et al., 2020),
Gober, 2007; Morote, Saurí, & Hernández, 2016). In arid climates, amplifying socioeconomic vulnerability. Populations that are more
evaporative water loss from pools can be as a proxy for annual outdoor vulnerable tend to live in warmer urban areas, in part, because the
water use, which can sometimes equal the depth of the pool. Conse­ additional cost of outdoor water to irrigate and fill pools is an unaf­
quently, the presence of pools is one of the strongest determinants of fordable luxury (Hall et al., 2016; Harlan, Brazel, Prashad, Stefanov, &
outdoor water consumption because of relatively high water loss rates Larsen, 2006; Harlan et al., 2014). In Phoenix, affluence was found to
increase significantly single-family residential water consumption dur­
ing drought, “with the most important variable being the percentage of lots in
Table 1 a census tract with swimming pools” (Balling, Gober, & Jones, 2008, p. 9).
Comparison of water consumption data for outdoor water uses, particularly
The same is true for neighborhoods that are greener: affluent commu­
residential swimming pools. Study locations are also given to illustrate range in
nities tend to have more irrigated landscapes (Zhu & Zhang, 2008;
consumption values depending on climate, geography, and urban design.
Jenerette et al., 2013). Water consumption in Phoenix is driven by
Estimated water consumption for Geography Source
landscaping practices more than by climatic conditions (Balling &
pools
Gober, 2007). Investments in landscaping leads to a 0.5 ◦ C cooling
Seventy-three percent of a Phoenix, AZ Mayer et al., 1999 benefit for every $10,000 increase in annual household income in
household’s water is for outdoor
Phoenix (Jenerette et al., 2007). Exacerbating the problem is the pro­
uses
Pool evaporation, cleaning, and Phoenix, AZ Harlan et al., 2009 nounced temperature variation that exists between neighborhoods that
refilling require 92,222 gallons can water the landscape to cool their immediate surroundings (e.g., Park
of water annually to maintain a Cool Islands; Brownlow, 2006) and those that are unable to afford water
37 m2 pool
to support “luxury activities” (Siebrits, 2012).
Properties with pools use more Phoenix, AZ Wentz & Gober, 2007
than twice as much water Through a process known as “redlining”, banks and lenders largely
outdoors compared to those excluded ethnic minorities and low-income populations from post-
without swimming pools World War II suburbia and the public investment that helped build it
6.8% of Tucson Water’s annual Tucson, AZ Halper et al., 2015 by grading neighborhoods based on perceived lending risk (Rothstein,
SFR demand during 6-month
2017; McGhee, 2021). For example, the 1940 Street Guide to Phoenix
pool season due only to
evaporation and Vicinity map, published by Scott Engineering Co., blatantly graded
Pools require at least 83,000 L of Los Angeles, CA Antonelli, 2015 neighborhoods according to their ethnic composition, describing one
water per year (total exceeding neighborhood as “very ragged, occupied by Mexicans, Negroes and the low
3.5 million liters of water
class of white people’’, while confidently describing a nearby affluent
annually for all of Los Angeles)
Pools use approximately 68 kl of California, Lee & Heaney, 2008
neighborhood as “…well planned and highly restricted” (Nelson, Winling,
water per annum (or 16.7 cm/ Florida, and Marciano, & Connolly, 2021). Racial integration was explicitly avoided
m2/day) Arizona through discriminatory housing policies and practices. In Phoenix, AZ,
Water consumption for a pool is Austria, Germany Neunteufel, Richard, & home deeds with racial restrictive covenants restricted sales and leases
approximately 40 L per day Perfler, 2012
to “anyone who is, or if married whose spouse is, or the members of whose
Properties with pools used on South Africa Fisher-Jeffes, Gertse, &
average13–25% (3.5–5.2 kl) Armitage, 2015 immediate family are of other than the White or Caucasian race…” (Mar­
more municipal water than icopa County Recorder’s Office, 1948). As a result, ethnic minorities
properties without pools; water were boxed out of newly developed communities designed around pri­
consumption for swimming
vatized water-intensive luxury activities. The legacy of redlining policies
pools was 2,200–2,400 L/month
or 7%–8% of the total water
is far-reaching, and its negative effects are evident in both the built
demand environments and human residents. For example, neighborhoods that
Forty-four percent of pool volume Southeastern Morote, Hernández, & were redlined nearly a century earlier still lack equitable amounts of
replaced annually Spain Rico, 2016 greenspace (Nardone, Rudolph, Morello-Frosch, & Casey, 2021) and,
Properties with pools increase Barcelona, Spain Vidal et al., 2011
consequently, experience elevated land surface temperatures compared
water consumption by 155 L per
day to non-redlined communities, sometimes by as much as 7 ◦ C (Hoffman,
Swimming pool ownership adds Barcelona, Spain Domene & Saurí, 2006 Shandas, & Pendleton, 2020). Urban environments with dispropor­
37.88 L per day per capita tionate patterns and intensities of green and blue spaces may leave some
The average evaporation rate is Balearic Islands, Hof, Morán-Tejeda, populations unable to cope with rapidly changing climate conditions,
4.4 L m− 2 per day. The water Spain Lorenzo-Lacruz, &
needed to refill the total of Blázquez-Salom, 2018
aging water infrastructure, and shifting water security (Wilder, Liver­
62,599 swimming pools and to man, Bellante, & Osborne, 2016; Mitchell & Chakraborty, 2018; Gabbe
counteract evaporative water & Pierce, 2020; Kim & Jung, 2020; Wilson, 2020; Mashhoodi, 2021;
loss is equivalent to 1.2 pools per Nardone et al., 2021).
year (annual losses of
This study builds on an expanding body of work focused on envi­
approximately 2 m)
Properties with pools consumed Cape Town, South Siebrits, 2012 ronmental inequities in Metro Phoenix, AZ through (1) a multiscalar
37.36% or 8.85 kl more water Africa pattern analysis of outdoor water footprint (Nouri, Borujeni, & Hoek­
per month on average than stra, 2019), with a particular emphasis on residential swimming pools
properties without swimming and mappable urban waterways, including reservoirs, lakes, ponds, and
pools
An average pool (6.2 m by 6.2 m Mallorca Hof & Schmitt, 2011
water fountains, but not rivers, streams, and canals, and greenness; (2)
and 1.5 m deep) loses about 70 an assessment of the linkage, if any, of greenness and blueness of com­
m3 of water per year by munities and socioeconomic vulnerability, (3) an evaluation of the dif­
evaporation, or 122% of its ferences, if any, in the greenness and blueness of present day
filling capacity
communities that were either redlined or graded as “best” 80 years ago;

2
J. Napieralski et al.
and (4) a spatial correlation between the severity of the urban heat is­
land effect and the distribution of pools, surface water, and vegetation in
the previously redlined neighborhoods.
2. Study area
Metro Phoenix (Arizona, USA), formally recognized as the Phoenix-
Mesa-Scottsdale Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA) by the U.S. Census,
consists of the City of Phoenix and 26 municipalities containing over 4.7
million inhabitants that are unequally distributed over 37,500 km2. To
ensure a diverse sample of environmental landscapes and socio-ethnic
populations, we selected a study area composed of two transects that
cut across portions of 357 U.S. Census tracts. The northern transect in­
cludes southern Scottsdale and northern Phoenix and is composed of 87
census tracts and the southern tract includes Chandler and Gilbert in the
southeast, central Phoenix, and Glendale and Sun City in the northwest
(Fig. 1).
Popularly known as the “Valley of the Sun”, Metro Phoenix is a
desirable place to live because of the desert climate, averaging 295 days
of sunshine. However, the hot temperatures and intense sun, combined
with urban sprawl, increase the urban heat island (UHI) effect,
contributing to pronounced localized temperature variations that
generate public health issues, increase energy demand, and necessitate
more water usage (Guhathakurta & Gober, 2010; Bolin, Seetharam, &
Fig. 1. Study area map of Metro Phoenix showing the two transects of CDC/ATSDR’s Social Vulnerability Index (SVI) used in this study to compare against outdoor
water footprint (Wolkin et al., 2015). The SVI is at the US census tract level.
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Landscape and Urban Planning 226 (2022) 104498
Pompeii, 2010). The region also receives little rainfall, with approxi­
mately 25 cm annually and measurable precipitation events occurring
only 32 days of the year. Because evaporation outpaces precipitation,
municipal water for Metro Phoenix derives from multiple sources:
regulated groundwater from local aquifers; surface water from the Salt
and Verde Rivers delivered by the Salt River Project (SRP); surface water
from the Colorado River from the Central Arizona Project (CAP); and
treated effluent (Bolin et al., 2010). Some Metro Phoenix communities
rely on “water-haulers” that move water from relatively water-rich
communities (e.g., Scottsdale) to newly developed, water-poor com­
munities (e.g., Rio Verde Foothills) (Bassler, 2022).
Each neighborhood has a unique water portfolio, which is some
combination of groundwater and surface water. However, because
desert conditions make it difficult to balance groundwater aquifer
recharge with rates of withdrawal, communities that rely strictly on
groundwater sources are more vulnerable to droughts and aquifer
depletion (Bolin et al., 2010). Although Phoenix was one of the cities
hardest hit by the foreclosure crisis that started in 2008 (Hollander,
2011), its trajectory of expansion has continued and it remains one of
the fastest growing cities in the U.S. However, Arizona is simultaneously
experiencing substantial drought-driven water shortages that could
widen the water use gap between affluent and poorer communities. Just
as the foreclosure crisis disproportionately impacted poor people of
color (Burd-Sharps & Rasch, 2015), the increasing impacts of climate
J. Napieralski et al.
change are likely to weigh heaviest upon vulnerable populations. As
Fig. 1 illustrates, social vulnerability is not randomly or evenly distrib­
uted, but is rather densely clustered in South Phoenix, an area charac­
terized by environmental hazards and substandard housing as well as
marginalized minority populations (Grineski, Bolin, & Boone, 2007).
3. Data acquisition, mapping, and analysis
3.1. Swimming pools
The identification and mapping of swimming pools was limited to
the study transects and used a modified version of the manual approach
employed by Vidal et al. (2011). While object-based classifications using
geographic information systems (GIS) are becoming increasingly
commonplace, automating pool identification is still problematic
because the spectral signatures of pools may vary based on water quality
(e.g., non-maintained) and quantity (e.g., partially filled pools), shading
from tree canopy or buildings, or the presence of pool covers. Manual
identification was accomplished visually using three sources: (1) the
World Imagery basemap from Living Atlas (natural color imagery ac­
quired between 2019 and 2021 from WorldView-2 Satellite Sensor with
0.5 m resolution); (2) the National Agriculture Imagery Program (NAIP)
(natural color imagery from 2017 at a resolution of 1 m); and (3) NAIP
Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) imagery from 2017,
which emphasizes vegetation intensity, but also provided a second
source for locating pools that are partly under tree canopy or covered.
Pool data were then aggregated for each census tract.
The distribution of pools was calculated using three static indicators:
number of pools per 100 residents, number of pools per 100 single-
family housing units, and number of pools per km2 (Salvati, Ridolfi,
Zambon, Serra, & Sauri, 2015). However, pool distribution was mapped
using points, so calculating the average surface of pools for each tract
required an alternative sampling approach. The average surface area of
pools was calculated by dividing the 357 tracts into 10 bins based on SVI
values (see next section) and randomly selecting 40 single-family parcels
(downloaded from Maricopa County’s GIS Open Data portal) within 40
different tracts of varying vulnerability. This resulted in 1,600 residen­
tial parcels that may or may not have included a pool. The assumption is
that pool size will generally correlate positively with income (Harlan,
Yabiku, Larsen, & Brazel, 2009; Siebrits, 2012) and therefore will
correlate negatively with social vulnerability. The randomized selection
process relied on points generated from ArcGIS Pro’s Create Random
Points tool. If a point was not on a single-family housing unit parcel, it
was moved toward the nearest single-family parcel. Pool boundaries
were digitized, tabulated, and aggregated with data from other similar
tracts to produce representative pool areas based on vulnerability.
3.2. Social vulnerability
Social vulnerability was determined using the Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention (CDC) and Agency for Toxic Substances and
Disease Registry (ATSDR) Social Vulnerability Index (SVI) for 2018,
which is focused on 15 U.S. census variables covering 4 major topics:
socioeconomic status, household composition, housing and trans­
portation, and race, ethnicity, and language. While the SVI was designed
to support disaster management and planning (e.g., Flanagan, Gregory,
Hallisey, Heitgerd, & Lewis, 2011; Wolkin et al., 2015; Flanagan, Hal­
lisey, Adams, & Lavery, 2018; Lehnert, Wilt, Flanagan, & Hallisey,
2020), the diversity of variables and approach to determining vulnera­
bility has broader applications, including thermal and water inequities.
This index was chosen instead of other hazard-specific indices, such as
the Heat Vulnerability Index (HVI) (Harlan, Declet-Barreto, Stefanov, &
Petitti, 2013) or the Social Vulnerability Index (SoVI) (Cutter & Finch,
2008) (see Watkins et al., 2021 for a comparison), because the SVI (a)
ensures method duplicability for other urban areas in the United States;
(b) can be used to evaluate overall vulnerability or focus on subtopics;
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Landscape and Urban Planning 226 (2022) 104498
and (c) is a readily available, updated database from the U.S. Census
Bureau that is used for a wide range of public health emergencies. SVI
scores range between 1.0 (most vulnerable) to 0.0 (least vulnerable).
The SVI is designed around several themes, including the percentile
ranking for minority status and language. Tracts considered vulnerable
overall in the study area scored high (0.87) for minority status and non-
English speaking, while tracts classified as least vulnerability scored low
(0.23) due to a population of predominantly native English speaking,
white residents.
3.3. Surface water bodies
In addition to identifying pools, surface water bodies were accessed
from the National Hydrography Dataset Plus High Resolution (NHDPlus
HR), available from the United States Geological Survey (USGS). The
dataset was edited to include all discernable surface water bodies, such
as water present on golf courses, using a combination of basemap im­
agery and NAIP photos. Many surface water bodies in Metro Phoenix
may not be maintained or filled year around, so multiple high-resolution
images were used to identify the permanence of surface water.
Ephemeral, intermittent, and perennial channels and canals were not
included because we were interested in calculating the surface area of
waterbodies. The outdoor surface water footprint was derived by adding
waterbody area to estimated surface area of pools per tract..
3.4. Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI)
The percent greenness of tracts and parcels was derived from the
NAIP NDVI images following Nardone et al., 2021. The data were
reclassified so that NDVI values of 0.15 (Halper et al., 2015) and greater
were designated as vegetation. Percent vegetated area in parcels and
tracts were calculated from NDVI and added to tract pool area to esti­
mate percent of parcel and tract that consumes outdoor water.
3.5. Historic Home Owners’ Loan Corporation (HOLC) grades
Digitized maps from the University of Richmond’s Digital Scholar­
ship Lab (Nelson et al., 2021) show where lenders and bankers redlined
neighborhoods to reflect mortgage security in the 1930s, before the
surge of suburbanization in many U.S. cities. Neighborhoods were
graded from A (Best) to D (Hazardous). Though the segregative grading
of communities occurred nearly 80 years ago, D-graded neighborhoods
in Phoenix, AZ are still predominantly non-white (70%), while A-graded
neighborhoods are mostly white (71%).
3.6. Urban Heat Island (UHI) Index
The Trust for Public Land manages the Urban Heat Island Index for
U.S. cities, a raster dataset accessed from the ArcGIS Living Atlas, which
shows relative heat severity based on differences between calculated air
temperature and surface temperature. The data are displayed on a scale
of 1 to 5, with 1 representing a relatively mild heat area (relative to the
mean for the city), and 5 indicating a severe heat area. The raster dataset
was derived from Landsat 8 imagery band 10 (ground-level thermal
sensor) during the summers of 2018 and 2019 at a resolution of 30 m.
The data were clipped using the 357 census tracts and HOLC boundaries,
and the results were aggregated into count (grid cell), mean, and sum.
4. Results
4.1. Distribution of swimming pools and water-rich landscapes
The total number of pools identified within the study area was
133,305, of which 53,895 were within the northern transect. Based on
data from the 2018 American Community Survey (ACS) for both tran­
sects, this equates to 8.5 pools per one hundred residents, one pool for
J. Napieralski et al.
every 5 housing units, and 125 pools per km2. The percentage of pools in
neighborhoods varied substantially; some communities exhibited desert
landscapes (i.e., limited greenness and blueness), characterized by few if
any discernible pools, to nearby communities defined by lush, irrigated
areas where most properties contained their own pools. Approximately
21.4% of the study area was classified as vegetated with NDVI values of
0.15 or greater. As with the distribution of pools, there were areas of
well-maintained vegetation, including gardens, parks, and golf courses,
while other areas were either part of the built-up urban core composed
of intense commercial or industrial land uses, or residential properties
lacking any vegetation. Finally, the percent areas considered vegetated
were combined with water body and pool areas to derive outdoor water
footprint per capita.
4.2. Water-rich landscapes and social vulnerability
Understanding the link between social vulnerability, as defined by
the CDC, and outdoor water features was first accomplished at the parcel
level, and then extrapolated to the tracts of the study area. At the parcel
level, this included pool count and pool area. The results show a
decreasing trend of pool count, pool size, water bodies, and percent
NDVI as vulnerability increased (Fig. 2). Average pool sizes in the least
vulnerable SVI categories (0.01 to 0.1) were approximately 50% larger
than the most vulnerable (0.9 to 1.0), and pool count was similarly
disproportionate, as 65% of parcels had a pool compared to just 2.5%.
The amount of vegetation within parcels followed the same trend: low
vulnerability communities had a higher percent of property classified as
vegetated (24% versus 15%) than highly vulnerable communities. The
pool size for a parcel, if any, was combined with the percent parcel
classified as vegetated using NDVI. Sixty percent of the property area of
low vulnerable parcels included a combination of pool and/or
Fig. 2. Correlations between the 2018 CDC and ATSDR Social Vulnerability Index (SVI) and swimming pool count (A) and pool surface area (B). SVI is also correlated
against greenness (C), derived from the 2018 National Agriculture Imagery Program (NAIP) Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), and the combined
surface area footprint of blue space (e.g. pools and waterbodies) and vegetation (e.g. greenness) (D).
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Landscape and Urban Planning 226 (2022) 104498
vegetation. This number decreased to only 16% for parcels classified as
high vulnerability.
The same general correlations existed between surface water and
vegetation and vulnerability at the tract level. Tracts with an SVI range
of 0.0–0.2 had 46% of all pools identified within the study area, while
tracts with an SVI of 0.8–1.0 only had 7%, even though the vulnerable
tracts had a larger population by more than 15%. The percent of tract
classified as vegetated was bimodal: SVI ranges of 0.0–0.5 averaged
around 24%, but 17% for tracts with an SVI range of 0.5–1.0. Surface
water bodies were nearly absent from tracts with high vulnerability, as
93% of identified surface water bodies were mapped in tracts with an
SVI between 0.0 and 0.5. Based on the mean pool area calculated at the
parcel level for each SVI, the total surface area for pools was calculated
for each tract. The cumulative surface area of 133,000 pools was 5.29
km2, which exceeded that of surface water bodies (5.0 km2). However,
1.94 km2 of that total pool surface area was associated with the least
vulnerable populations (SVI = 0.0–0.1) (Fig. 3A). Pool surface area was
added to the surface water body area for each tract, and then divided by
population to calculate the outdoor surface water footprint per capita.
On average, there was 18.5 m2 of surface water per capita available in
the least vulnerable communities, but only 0.8 m2 of water for the most
vulnerable populations (Fig. 3B).
4.3. Historically redlined neighborhoods and present-day landscape
characterization
The HOLC graded 25 communities within Phoenix in 1940 (Fig. 4).
Because the HOLC boundaries do not align with present-day census tract
boundaries, population and number of housing units were estimated
using the 2010 Decennial Census Block data. According to the 2010
Census, there were approximately 64,801 residents and 33,194 housing
J. Napieralski et al.
Fig. 3. Correlations between surface of waterbodies, which were derived from the National Hydrography Dataset (NHD) Waterbodies and edited using high-
resolution imagery, including pools, ponds, and lakes, and the 2018 CDC and ATSDR Social Vulnerability Index (SVI) (A), and outdoor water footprint (area of
blue and green/population) per capita against social vulnerability (B).
units within the 25 HOLC communities. Communities graded as an “A”
constituted the smallest area, while those classified as “D” had the
largest. The number of pools per 100 residents and the percent area
classified as vegetated exhibited a decreasing trend from A (Best) to D
(Hazardous). There is currently 1 pool for every 5 residents in neigh­
borhoods that were classified as “safe” in 1940, but 1 pool for every
1,000 residents in those graded D. Although relatively small neighbor­
hoods, the percent of A neighborhoods considered vegetated based on
NDVI was 51%, far above the average percent for the least vulnerable
tracts for the entire study area (24%). Only 6% of D neighborhoods were
“green”, although it is important to note this percent would be lower if
not for several neighborhood parks, as most parcels lacked green space.
4.4. Water-rich landscapes, social vulnerability, historically redlined
neighborhoods, and the urban heat island index
Finally, the disparity between blue and green space distribution
within A, B, C, and D neighborhoods were compared against the Trust
for Public Land’s Urban Heat Island (UHI) Index to evaluate broad
patterns between environmental characteristics and propensity for
urban heating. The UHI data were aggregated for each set of graded
neighborhoods (Fig. 4). Neighborhoods graded D in 1940 now have 86%
of the area experiencing some intensity (1–5) of heating (see Fig. 4). In
contrast, A-graded neighborhoods currently have 0% effect from UHI.
Additionally, the only areas experiencing “severe” (significantly above
the mean city temperature) heating were D neighborhoods.
5. Discussion
Mapping the distribution of residential pools in Metro Phoenix
revealed a sharp disparity between neighborhoods that have a high
percentage of homes with pools, and other neighborhoods that lack blue
space altogether. While this largely reflects socioeconomics, it is also
related to age of homes. As many as half of new housing units built
between the late 1970s and 1990s included a pool (50% of new homes in
the mid-1990s), but this number has since dropped to less than 20% of
new homes (City of Phoenix Water Resource Plan, 2021). Decades of
pool installations in an arid environment has resulted in an increased
demand on water, chemicals, and energy to support a luxury lifestyle.
Based on estimates from this study, and assuming an average pool depth
of 1.4 m (Morote, Saurí, et al., 2016), over 7 billion liters of water are
stored in 133,000 pools within our two transects. However, the high
evaporation rate in Metro Phoenix also means that billions of liters of
water are needed each year to replace losses. Additionally, the man­
agement of a residential pool requires additional energy, whether to
generate pool chemicals, to pump and filter, or to manage residential
water supply. As the count of residential pools in the U.S. likely exceeds
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Landscape and Urban Planning 226 (2022) 104498
10 million, many located in the Sun Belt, the collective water and energy
demand for all of these pools indubitably contributes to a disparity in
localized urban temperatures, water scarcity, wealth gaps, and, more
broadly, global climate change.
Reducing water consumption can be a challenge. The most vulner­
able populations in this study area tend to have no formal landscaping
and fewer pools, and they are less financially capable of handling abrupt
changes in water pricing and infrastructure. Mieno and Braden (2011)
found that “high-income residents are relatively unresponsive to water price
increases”, while the least vulnerable populations exhibit diametrically
opposed behaviors with water conservation practices. On the one hand,
higher environmental literacy and access to high-quality modern water
saving appliances may contribute to water conservation, but at the same
time, the pursuit of high-water lifestyles continues largely unabated
(Harlan et al., 2009; Ouyang, Wentz, Ruddell, & Harlan, 2014; Medwind
and Mack, 2021).
The issue of water inequity in Metro Phoenix is also related to ge­
ography, as each neighborhood is supplied water from a patchwork of
different surface, subsurface, and treated sources. In the City of Phoenix,
this consists of primarily surface water from the Salt (52%) and Colorado
Rivers (38%) and minimal dependence on groundwater, whereas
neighboring cities are much more dependent on groundwater, which
can account for up to 100% of the water portfolio (Fig. 5). Neighbor­
hoods with a high outdoor water footprint experience less severity of
urban heat island effects, while vulnerable populations in Phoenix live
in neighborhoods that are less green, less blue, and much warmer
(Harlan et al., 2006).
The relationship between outdoor water footprint, vulnerability, and
racism is complex, but our results verify the lasting impact of racist
housing policies established nearly a century earlier on the urban
environment. This is evident in at least three different areas. First,
communities graded “D” by the HOLC in 1940 still fall within tracts that
are scored by the CDC as highly vulnerable. There has been minimal
social and economic progress in these neighborhoods, while munici­
palities outside the City of Phoenix, such as Scottsdale and Chandler,
design lush landscapes on highly valued desert land. Jenerette, Harlan,
Stefanov, and Martin (2011) suggested the urban ecosystem-income gap
between vulnerable and non-vulnerable populations in Metro Phoenix is
a more recent phenomenon. While this is true for a large portion of
Metro Phoenix, it seems the gaps between HOLC graded communities
have changed little between 1940 and 2020. A-graded communities are
still substantially more blue and green (see Fig. 4) and many parcels
within D-graded communities have been rezoned to commercial or in­
dustrial uses, creating less livable conditions for occupants of the
remaining residential properties.
Second, our findings show a substantial difference between the
amount of green and blue space in high versus low vulnerability areas.
J. Napieralski et al. Landscape and Urban Planning 226 (2022) 104498

Fig. 4. Home Owners’ Loan Corporation (HOLC) graded neighborhoods in Phoenix from the 1940s showing the current number of pools within each grade, percent
green based on the 2018 National Agriculture Imagery Program (NAIP) Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), and percent area experiencing urban heat
island effect (Trust for Public Land’s Urban Heat Island (UHI) Index).

Those graded “A” in the 1940 s demonstrate the legacy of these housing
policies with 50% of the zone areas classified as green space and 1 pool
for every 5 residents. In contrast, “D” communities now have only 6%
green space and only 1 pool per 1,000 residents.
Third, our results indicate that “D” communities are experiencing a
near-ubiquitous impact (86% of total area) from the urban heat island,
while “A” communities show almost no impact. This may be an un­
avoidable result of a disproportionate distribution and range of outdoor
water footprints, sometimes over short distances. The potential links
between the urban heat island riskscape and blue and green space needs
more multiscalar assessments to trace the origins of the problem,
correlate between the presence of pools and the impact on urban heat­
ing, and provide management solutions to improve the quality of life for
vulnerable populations.
There were a few assumptions and limitations with the process of
mapping pools. Mapping pools manually assumes a static count, even
though we accept that pools can be added or removed from properties in
between images used for interpretation. Since a vast majority of
observed pools were in-ground, it is accepted that removal is an
expensive endeavor; instead, there may be a number of empty or half-
filled pools. In fact, during the Great Recession, unused pools were
identified as health hazards because of their role in breeding mosquitos
(Hollander, 2011). Municipal parcel or real estate records may list
housing units with pools, but active management and use is more
complicated, although this can be extracted from monthly water
metered data. Identifying pools in more irrigated landscapes with large

7
J. Napieralski et al.
Fig. 5. Map of Metro Phoenix and study area transects relating the spatial patterns of pools, which are summarized within 1 km hexagon tessellations, to municipal
water sources (i.e., water portfolios) for communities within or adjacent to the study area (water source data from Bolin et al., 2010).
trees also increased the probability of undercounting pools if pools were
within the shadows of buildings and trees. Finally, the approach to
measuring pool area and using mean values by SVI to estimate surface
water area assumes limited variability within tracts, although it is
possible that a single tract may have diverse socioeconomic commu­
nities that likewise contain a broad range of pool types and sizes.
However, the relationship between pool count or size and SVI showed
little variability. An exception was one high-vulnerable tract that had
fewer than ten pools out of hundreds of parcels, yet the only selected
parcel with a pool had an unusually large size compared to other pools in
the same neighborhood. As a result, we reported outdoor water foot­
print, which considers both count and mean size in comparison to
population.
Finally, in this study, an NDVI value of 0.15 or higher was used to
indicate the presence of greenness, or “unusually green vegetation”
(Halper et al., 2015) within parcels, tracts, and HOLC neighborhoods.
This method does not distinguish between irrigated or non-irrigated
vegetation, determine biomass, or predict landscaping practice, even
though the authors recognize these are important factors to consider.
Rather, in a relatively dry landscape where natural vegetation is sparse,
it does provide an indication of irrigation practices because the level of
greenness is driven by outdoor water consumption for landscaping.
Higher intensities of greenness correlate to higher water use, as does the
type of vegetation managed in gardens and parks. In a city like Phoenix,
mesic landscaping, including deciduous plants and turf, consumes a
substantial amount of water, especially when residents use flood
8
Landscape and Urban Planning 226 (2022) 104498
irrigation techniques (Whitman, 2021). However, even when residents
switch to xeric vegetation or no formal landscaping that requires little or
no irrigation, old water infrastructures and habits may maintain high
water demand.
6. Conclusion
This study shows that as the percent area of green and blue spaces
increases, social vulnerability of residents decreases. Although this study
focuses on linking outdoor water footprint to social vulnerability in
Metro Phoenix, water inequity is pervasive in many cities. The con­
sumption of outdoor water within arid cities is particularly problematic,
as it is usually not a recoverable source of water. This is particularly true
with residential swimming pools, which demand substantial amounts of
replacement water each year. While the financial and environmental
cost of maintaining green and blue spaces in arid communities is high,
the consequence of not doing so intensifies localized heat exposure that
increases heat-related health issues, and most frequently for vulnerable
populations (e.g., Gober et al., 2010). Even worse, as climate change
intensifies, these uneven patterns of conspicuous water consumption
will only exacerbate the city’s blue and green gulfs, with the penalty
falling on the most vulnerable.
Discriminatory mortgage lending practices have been linked to heat
and green space disparities, yet few studies investigated the effect of
redlining with regards to blue space availability. This study illustrates
the long-term environmental legacy of redlining communities eighty
J. Napieralski et al.
years ago, as previously redlined neighborhoods still exhibit fewer
pools, surface water features and vegetation, but also show a much
higher incidence of the urban heat island effect. Ironically, the older
neighborhoods of South Phoenix that were more likely to be graded “D”
on the HOLC scale were originally built on the remains of an indigenous
irrigation canal system, that was filled and replaced by a more extensive
system designed to capture water from afar (Gober, 2006). The pro-
growth posture of Phoenix has exacerbated spatial inequality by
further isolating these vulnerable populations (Bolin et al., 2010). Like
these previous studies, our findings highlight the need for more rigorous
and equitable urban planning and development, especially as climate
change amplifies water security and equity problems.
Addressing the current disparity in land use composition and out­
door water consumption between communities is a challenge, requiring
more locally designed adaptation strategies and monitoring to reduce
heat exposure by increasing shading, greenness, and access to blue
space. At the same time, water-rich lifestyles in arid cities consume too
much water, much of it imported, and blueness and greenness are
frequently ingrained in consumption habits and supported by urban
design. Socially vulnerable communities will likely become more water
vulnerable as utilities raise water rates for residential customers (e.g.,
Medwind and Mack, 2020), even though they use much less water than
affluent communities. Most vulnerable populations lack the resources
and support to cope with rapidly changing climate conditions and
shifting water security. This requires community-engaged management
plans that attempt to balance the distribution and access to outdoor
water resources, and to protect and expand existing public parks and
waterways.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial
interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence
the work reported in this paper.
Acknowledgements
The authors are grateful for comments and suggestions from Martin
Doyle and Kelli Larson during the early stages of this project. The au­
thors are appreciative of the feedback and edits from two external re­
viewers that improved this manuscript. Finally, Audrey Taylor was
funded by the University of Michigan-Dearborn’s 2021 Summer Un­
dergraduate Research Experience (SURE) program, which supported
some of the mapping, analysis, and writing for this project.
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