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Lots of subtropical climates in Europe. Even Sochi, Russia is a good example of a sub-tropical climate in "continental" Europe - with the influence of a big inland sea.
Yes that is annoying. Its got to do with the ocean temperatures I think. Its always windy here aswell, I can remember alot of times last winter where we had a low humidity and a dew point of like -7c and when the sun went down we only reached like -1c because of the wind. Its like constant.
Although there are parts of ths UK that average lows of below 0c. We aren't always at 2-5c. Infact I would say that it is rare to get a low of 5c that is quite mild.
Not sure about ocean temps. Although they do make your climate warmer than might otherwise be expected, much of NZ gets the same average lows, with sea temps than are warmer 5-6 degrees warmer in winter. I think greater cloud cover would be the main reason. Less radiation frosts, but more severe when you do get them.
What sort winds do you mean?. I'm used to thinking of winter as a time of still nights, apart from fronts.
Not sure about ocean temps. Although they do make your climate warmer than might otherwise be expected, much of NZ gets the same average lows, with sea temps than are warmer 5-6 degrees warmer in winter. I think greater cloud cover would be the main reason. Less radiation frosts, but more severe when you do get them.
What sort winds do you mean?. I'm used to thinking of winter as a time of still nights, apart from fronts.
The thing is New Zealand is higher and covers more land. But to be honest I do think the Wind is a major factor in our temperatures as it is often windy here quite often. As for cloud I think that would another major factor even stronger than the wind. But I often have nights with no wind or no cloud and then all of a sudden the wind picks up for some unknown reason.
The thing is New Zealand is higher and covers more land. But to be honest I do think the Wind is a major factor in our temperatures as it is often windy here quite often. As for cloud I think that would another major factor even stronger than the wind. But I often have nights with no wind or no cloud and then all of a sudden the wind picks up for some unknown reason.
NZ is bigger than the United Kingdom , but smaller than the British Isles. Also a lot further away from major land masses, so I don't think area would be the issue. It is higher, but most people live on the coast, or at low altitude. The main weather stations around here are by the beach, but records average lows typical of inland England. The mountains could provide a pool of cold air in some situations. Perhaps your winds are downslope winds.
What ratio of warm fronts to cold fronts to highs do you have there?. NZ has frequent highs that produce rapid cooling. Perhaps the UK spends more time under weak warm/cold systems without a clearing high? - similar to the weather here for the last 2 grey, soggy weeks.
NZ is bigger than the United Kingdom , but smaller than the British Isles. Also a lot further away from major land masses, so I don't think area would be the issue. It is higher, but most people live on the coast, or at low altitude. The main weather stations around here are by the beach, but records average lows typical of inland England. The mountains could provide a pool of cold air in some situations. Perhaps your winds are downslope winds.
What ratio of warm fronts to cold fronts to highs do you have there?. NZ has frequent highs that produce rapid cooling. Perhaps the UK spends more time under weak warm/cold systems without a clearing high?
Ok the thing is, New Zealand probably does get more High pressure systems than here. But High pressure systems are not rare here, the problem is they are usually maritime and bring alot of cloud i.e the azores high. Last winter we had a very strong azores high which resulted in very mild weather. To get sunshine out of a high pressure in the UK it needs to be an arctic one from Greenland or from mainland Europe. The thing is at my location if we get high pressure it is usually cloudy, most of the sunshine in my area comes from Northernly airstreams, that is why we had more extreme temperatures back in 2010 winter.
I think it is because New Zealand is on the west of the pacific ocean and the uk is on the east of the atlantic ocean. Usually being on the west of a continent means that you get alot of cloud for some reason.
I don't know where you would find that ratio so i'm not sure. It could be anyones guess but I would say that we would get more cold fronts than warm fronts here. They just aren't that cold for our latitude because the atlantic ocean always moderates them.
Isn't there a frequent high pressure system near new zealand called the australian high?
Certainly a good contender considering it's the highest market town in the country. There are other high altitude towns that lack a weather station at all, or long-term weather data.
Malham, a village in the Yorkshire Dales, is pretty cool, average lows of 30.9F in the coldest month.
As Joe mentioned, cloud cover is responsible, these places are all very cloudy and probably have very little nights during the winter that are actually clear allowing the temperature to fall, not to mention they are rather windy and the high altitude means there's no cold air pooling.
One thing these locations do generally excel at though is snowfall.. snowfall in these areas is often extreme, sometimes exceeding 100cm in parts of the Pennines, and often lasts a long time, and the wind creates amazing drifts that last a lot longer than the snow cover itself. Sadly, very deep snow and long lasting snow isn't completely certain here either, which would explain the lack of ski resorts in England.. for winter sports fans, England is a massive disappointment, and for snow lovers in general, it's best avoided
Last edited by dunno what to put here; 08-02-2012 at 03:27 PM..
Certainly a good contender considering it's the highest market town in the country. There are other high altitude towns that lack a weather station at all, or long-term weather data.
Malham, a village in the Yorkshire Dales, is pretty cool, average lows of 30.9F in the coldest month.
As Joe mentioned, cloud cover is responsible, these places are all very cloudy and probably have very little nights during the winter that are actually clear allowing the temperature to fall, not to mention they are rather windy and the high altitude means there's no cold air pooling.
One thing these locations do generally excel at though is snowfall.. snowfall in these areas is often extreme, sometimes exceeding 100cm in parts of the Pennines, and often lasts a long time, and the wind creates amazing drifts that last a lot longer than the snow cover itself. Sadly, very deep snow and long lasting snow isn't completely certain here either, which would explain the lack of ski resorts in England.. for winter sports fans, England is a massive disappointment, and for snow lovers in general, it's best avoided
The best example of a colder town than Buxton (by some way) is Shap, Cumbria. That place has very cool nights all round the year and highs 1 degree colder than Buxton all year round.
I'm not sure what you mean by "continental". The coast of Med France, Spain, Italy, Greece, Croatia have some excellent sub-tropical climates. I think you mean northern Europe like Germany, Netherlands, Norway, UK, etc. and certainly not France or Spain, etc. Check out the averages for a place like Nice for January and you will see it is clearly subtropical, and has far, far better winters (if you like warmth)than similar latitude locations in N. America.
MMM...Nice like Sotchi are protected from the Northern winds by a chain of mountains and are seaside ("riviera") towns. As soon as you drive a few doezns of miles inland in both cases, the climate changes and becomes clearly semi-continental. But agree, there are in southern Europe alog the Meditanean numerous zones and Islands (the Greek islands, Cyprius, coastal Sardinia and Corsica, Balearic islands) that can be considered subtropical, in a wider definition of what subtropical climates. Stricty subtropical in Europe in my book are the Canary islands and maybe Madeira and southern Azores (Sta Maria island)...
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