Rapid urbanization and densification, and the socioeconomic constraints of the urban poor have subjected these groups, including residents of informal settlements, to higher levels of heat risk. Increasing urbanization and growing populations meet weak institutional capacity and informal governance mechanisms to create socio-spatial relationships shaped by socioeconomic status. Through the UHI, extreme heat events are worsened, if not created by the interactions between social and natural factors; the burden of which is subject to an overlapping spatial distribution with that of poverty.