Maximizing the pedestrian radiative cooling benefit per street tree

•Efficiency of street tree radiative cooling depends on tree placement.•TUF-Pedestrian model quantifies impact of sidewalk tree spacing on pedestrian TMRT.•Spatial variation of directional longwave radiation loading on pedestrians captured.•More sidewalk tree cover increases TMRT reduction with modestly diminishing returns.•Equally-spaced trees among warm season sun-exposed pedestrian routes optimize cooling.