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Old 12-04-2011, 02:05 PM
 
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Every time I look at the weather temperatures for over night lows between Santa Cruz and SF, Santa Cruz is a good 5 - 6 degrees colder at night....but it's further south and it's also on the ocean. It makes no sense to me...

Tonight the low for SF is 45 but Santa Cruz I believe it was 34...can someone please explain this?

Sometimes even San Diego has colder over night lows than SF and that's 8 hours south of here!
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Old 12-04-2011, 02:48 PM
 
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Never found Oakland to be significantly colder than anywhere in the Bay Area...
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Old 12-04-2011, 03:12 PM
 
Location: South Korea
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Oakland is definitely often colder at night and in the morning than SF, especially in winter. I live in Rockridge and work in downtown SF, and I used to live in SF until July 2010. It is usually a good 5 to 10 degrees colder in Oakland, though often it will be exactly the same temperature.

I think it's that SF is right on the Pacific and surrounded by the Bay, and for whatever reason this keeps the temps from going very high in summer or very low in winter. Oakland is further inland and isn't as exposed to the Pacific so it doesn't get that "lake effect" so in summer it tends to be a bit warmer and a bit cooler in winter. It's not a big difference but it's noticeable. I think if you drive everywhere in your car or don't spend much time in both SF and Oakland in the morning like I do, you wouldn't notice the difference.

As for Santa Cruz I don't know, maybe it's that it faces south towards Monterey Bay rather than west towards the Pacific like SF.
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Old 12-04-2011, 03:12 PM
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by destroycreate View Post
Tonight the low for SF is 45 but Santa Cruz I believe it was 34...can someone please explain this?
San Francisco is surrounded by water on three sides. This moderates the temperature fluctuations.
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Old 12-04-2011, 03:21 PM
 
Location: The Bay
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Ultrarunner View Post
Never found Oakland to be significantly colder than anywhere in the Bay Area...

It's definitely significantly colder than the lower peninsula (RWC, San Carlos, etc.) and the South Bay.
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Old 12-04-2011, 05:37 PM
 
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I'm in East Oakland and often friends will say they had a hard frost in Rockridge or Montclair and no frost here...

Could be several factors... parts of Oakland have significant elevation or are in a wind tunnel of sorts.

East Oakland, like San Leandro is mostly protected...

Same thing for people I know in Castro Valley having frost and nothing where I am.

We also have sun all day

A few years ago a study tracked the best weather of major U.S. cities based on the number of heating and cooling months per year...

Oakland CA was the only city that made the best list for 2 of the 12 months
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Old 12-04-2011, 05:38 PM
 
Location: The Bay
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Ultrarunner View Post
I'm in East Oakland and often friends will say they had a hard frost in Rockridge or Montclair and no frost here...

Could be several factors... parts of Oakland have significant elevation or are in a wind tunnel of sorts.

East Oakland, like San Leandro is mostly protected...

Same thing for people I know in Castro Valley having frost and nothing where I am.

We also have sun all day

A few years ago a study tracked the best weather of major U.S. cities based on the number of heating and cooling months per year...

Oakland CA was the only city that made the best list for 2 of the 12 months

I also live in East Oakland... I love the weather here, but it is generally colder than the weather in SJ or the lower peninsula. I prefer the weather up here in Oakland though.
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Old 12-04-2011, 05:42 PM
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Nineties Flava View Post
I also live in East Oakland... I love the weather here, but it is generally colder than the weather in SJ or the lower peninsula. I prefer the weather up here in Oakland though.
I neglected to mention the affect of cloud cover... sometimes the marine layer will just stagnate over the city when less than a mile away through the tunnel it will be 20 degrees warmer...

I may have read too much into the question... my first thought of significant cold are areas with frost...
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Old 12-04-2011, 05:54 PM
 
Location: South Korea
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Again it really depends on what time of year you're talking about. In summer Oakland and SF will be pretty similar in the morning when the marine layer is sitting on both cities, but by mid-day Oakland will be way sunnier and way less windy and will be 5 to 10 degrees warmer on most days. In winter Oakland will be 5 to 10 degrees colder at night and in the morning, and both cities will be at similar temps by mid-day. Note though that I'm talking about North Oakland which I assume gets more of a chilly blast from the Pacific because we're right across from the Golden Gate.

And Rockridge definitely gets frost on cold mornings, I haven't seen it yet this winter (it's been super dry and hasn't been below 45 very often) but last winter we had it quite a bit in December and January.
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Old 12-04-2011, 06:26 PM
 
Location: Oakland, CA
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Quote:
Originally Posted by mayorhaggar View Post

And Rockridge definitely gets frost on cold mornings, I haven't seen it yet this winter (it's been super dry and hasn't been below 45 very often) but last winter we had it quite a bit in December and January.
Piedmont Ave area is warmer than Rockridge by several degrees actually. I never notices a significant difference in cold from SF to Oakland. But I have only seen frost on the street a handful of times living in my place over the past 7 years. Bay Area microclimates are hilarious. One of my friends lived in Rockridge. When I would go those 2 miles or so down the road and wonder....where is the sun :P It would be blazing on my side of Piedmont Ave. Grand Lake is even a bit warmer.
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