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Couple of things to point out....Toronto data is from older 1981-2010 normals.....
so a slight disadvantage....also, Milwaukee latitude is more like Buffalo, NY ...43N ...not 43.5N
and Milwaukee's airport is located south of the city closer to the lake than Toronto's Pearson Airport.
Boise is definitely the warmest...yes..the west is warmer...and Boise is at over 2,700 feet above sea level.
Boise has that warm up quicker in spring west of the Rockies...just like BC interior...in fact Boise is a slightly warmer version of Osoyoos, BC climate (and Boise is curiously slightly cooler in April).
Sioux Falls, South Dakota has the coldest winter but warms up nicely and has a hot summer (not as hot as Boise summer, where even september has a 27C / 81F average high!)
I like how Boise warms up nice and quick...March and April ...Sioux Falls catches up by May.
For a taste of what Boise would do at a lower elevation check out Pasco, WA. At latitude ~46°N it has a mean annual maximum of 19.4°C which is not far from Fredericksburg, VA (latitude 38°N, mean maximum 19.9°C) and Kitty Hawk, NC (latitude 36°N, mean maximum 19.8°C).
Of course Fredericksburg and Kitty Hawk have much warmer lows and thus warmer mean temperatures but Pasco still impresses nonetheless.
For a taste of what Boise would do at a lower elevation check out Pasco, WA. At latitude ~46°N it has a mean annual maximum of 19.4°C which is not far from Fredericksburg, VA (latitude 38°N, mean maximum 19.9°C) and Kitty Hawk, NC (latitude 36°N, mean maximum 19.8°C).
Of course Fredericksburg and Kitty Hawk have much warmer lows and thus warmer mean temperatures but Pasco still impresses nonetheless.
Pasco, Washington has really warm average highs for it's latitude...
along the other nearby Tri Cities ....Kennewick and Richland....also a mild gardening zone 8a (I think).
For me the most impressive climate for it's latitude is Kamloops, BC...almost 51N ....
could be the best climate in the world north of 50 degrees.
I think there are three big factors at work here. 1) the predominant Westerlies bring mild air masses to the west coast, and this helps keep baseline temperatures warmer in the West during the cooler part of the year. 2) In winter a huge mass of cold dry air builds up in the northern interior of the continent, and when this spills south it skews east, again because of the westerlies. 3) Summer temperatures in the East appear milder than they really are because humidity is much higher. All that humidity lowers actual temperatures but can make it feel even hotter. Someone mentioned Phoenix vs Atlanta earlier, I can say from experience that the desert southwest feels far more tolerable to me in the hot season than the extremely humid heat the southeast can get.
The reason the US east is so cold and western Europe/US is so warm is because of the Rockies which drive the Jetstream north over the west then south to Alabama before it heads north once more over the atlantic.
Are the Rockies also the reason Western Europe is so mild compared to East Asia?
I don’t think the mountains are important at all.
Folk moan about Seatlle - ,why ? Have they not heard of St Johns - someone should tell them .
People moan about Seattle because it has a pretty cloudy Nov-April and a pretty fantastic and sunny May-October. I think the contrast is what gets people. They spend the whole cloudy winter dreaming of that perfect summer. Whereas people in places like St Johns just expect crappy weather year round, they’re not holding out for something better.
But why do the mountains push the jet stream north? Why does the lack of mountains push it south again? Wouldn't they push the Jet Stream UP instead? Also, what about the other mountain ranges? Serra, Nevada, Cascade, Coast, etc. Do they have any roll in this? Here in Canada the Coast Mountains are taller than the Rockies, so why just the Rockies?
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The atmosphere is a fluid.
The entire North American Cordillera (which includes all of the western ranges) basically acts as a series of giant dams against cold air.
The coldest air in winter will always slide east of the Continental Divide. Of course all of the different mountain ranges play a roll in that. Just think of them as a series of High Dams that prevent cold air from spilling over them.
The entire North American Cordillera (which includes all of the western ranges) basically acts as a series of giant dams against cold air.
The coldest air in winter will always slide east of the Continental Divide. Of course all of the different mountain ranges play a roll in that. Just think of them as a series of High Dams that prevent cold air from spilling over them.
The role of the cordillera feels very exaggerated to me. There is no mountain chain to protect Western Europe from continental air. It isn’t needed, the predominant westerlies already do that.
The role of the cordillera feels very exaggerated to me. There is no mountain chain to protect Western Europe from continental air. It isn’t needed, the predominant westerlies already do that.
Western Europe has more water surrounding it though, since Europe's a peninsula, so Arctic air is moderated for them when they don't have westerlies. I used to read a weather forum for the Pacific Northwest and the people there were always complaining about how strong Arctic air masses have to be to not get shunted eastward by the Rockies and Cascades.
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