Temperature as an urban metabolic indicator: Simulating spatial configurations in hot and arid neighborhoods

Global temperatures are rising due to climate change, intensifying heat stress in urban areas. In hot, arid capitals such as Amman, exacerbated urban heat island effects threaten health, spike energy demand, and undermine socio-economic resilience. While large-scale interventions often exceed resource capacities in economically constrained contexts, neighborhood-scale spatial designs offer cost-effective pathways to modulate microclimates, a method common in urban metabolism studies focusing on air quality and climate as metabolic flows. This study employs ENVI-met microclimate simulations at peak summer hours to quantify how spatial configurations (the existing baseline, green pockets and corridors, traditional courtyard blocks, and semi-superblocks) impact on potential air temperature within a typical urban block. We model adjacent 150 × 150 M zones in Amman's neighborhoods under identical meteorological inputs, focusing on the thermal response to vegetation layout, courtyard footprint, and asphalt removal strategies. Findings reveal that transforming merely 5 % of the block area into green pockets instead of built area yields a mean temperature reduction of 1 °C. Courtyard-based building retrofits majorly enhanced interior thermal comfort with much less effect on the external streets. Notably, semi-superblock configurations had the largest impact by removing asphalt for pedestrianized zones, giving the best potential air temperature reduction result. Further analysis shows that air mixing dynamics underscore diminishing returns beyond the first asphalt increment, highlighting strategic removal over extensive clearance as the planner's priority. By establishing quantitative benchmarks, our results guide planners toward resilient, people-centered urban designs that balance thermal, ecological, and socio-economic objectives in arid cities like Amman. • Each 100m 2 unbuilt land lots reached approximate reductions of 0.1 °C in arid zones. • Courtyard housing inner zones were 2 °C cooler in comparison to outer zones. • When thresholds are crossed, temperature reduction is less due to heat retention capacity. • Strategic asphalt removal, rather than uniform, is most efficient to mitigate heat. • Asphalt pedestrianization showed highest temperature reduction in arid cities.