Is the 'Lubbock Effect' keeping rain away?

LUBBOCK, TX (KCBD) - In cities like Lubbock and beyond, there is often a belief that some sort of force is acting on the weather, keeping rain out of city limits.

In Lubbock, residents often call this the "Lubbock Effect" or the "Loop Effect." In St. Louis, it's known as the "Arch Effect." Meteorologists say urban areas can have an effect on weather but the extent is unknown.

"There are several effects that a city, especially when you get up to the size of Lubbock, has on the environment, the weather and the atmosphere," Jody James, Warning Coordination Meteorologist at the National Weather Service in Lubbock, said. "One of the most prominent is the 'urban heat island,' all the concrete, the freeways, the homes and everything is kind of a heat source."

James said that heat doesn't all go away overnight, so in the winter the city can be up to five to seven degrees hotter than the area around it.

"We also have pollutants in the city," James said. "We have a different biomass, a lot more trees than you have out in the cotton fields. Then the landscape changes, the smoothness of the land from farmland to a more rough terrain with the buildings and trees and houses. Those three things do affect the weather to some extent. There hasn't been a lot of research in that area but there does seem to be some effect on the wind and sometimes of the precipitation."

While some researchers have sought to find out how much a city influences the weather, James says not enough research has been done over an extensive area. However, there is some understanding.

"There have been some computer models that have looked at that and have noticed some convection or showers and thunderstorms that do change as they move across the city," James said. "Sometimes there have been some models that have shown splitting and breaking up and then reforming, maybe in more cells as you get east of the city."

James says a lot of weather systems overwhelm any effects the city would have and when looking at long-term averages of rain, urban environment influences aren't noticed.

"There may be some effect but whether it's less rain or more rain, I think it's a little to early to say," James said. "Everybody eventually gets the rain even if we have to wait longer for it."

He also said a lot of the "Lubbock Effect" is just perception and the odds are it will rain somewhere else before where you are.

"Exactly what's happening in any one case is difficult to determine," James said. "Certainly as the world becomes more urbanized it is affecting the weather and the meteorology in lots of ways. We'll probably learn more about that as more research is done."

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