Online Concerns About Urban Heat: Social Media, Temperature, and Urban Form

Urban residents are especially vulnerable to rising temperatures due to the urban heat island (UHI) effect. Yet, there is limited understanding of if and how they express heat-related concerns and how these responses are influenced by the urban tissue. In this study, we integrated social media data, on-site weather records, and remote sensing data to explore the relationship between heat-related social media content, urban temperatures, and urban form. We collected geolocated Twitter data posted from Mexico City during 2022. In addition, we used weather station air temperature data, and land surface temperature (LST) estimated from MODIS imagery. To represent the urban form of the city, we used the local climate zones (LCZ) classification scheme. Our results reveal an exponential increase in the frequency of heat-related Tweets as air temperatures rise. Furthermore, the proportion of heat-related Tweets is higher in LCZ with urban forms that exhibit elevated LST. These findings show that social media serves as a medium to communicate concerns about urban heat, with these expressions varying according to the urban form and its thermal characteristics.