Hey, I’m a
Architect evolving into an urban data scientist, driven by a passion for building climate-resilient cities through spatial data. Expanding my toolkit to include GIS, machine learning, and remote sensing — currently finishing my M.Sc. at KFUPM (GPA 4.0/4.0). Open to innovative smart city roles, research collaborations, and fully funded PhD opportunities.
I’m a licensed architect with 4+ years across professional design and project delivery who made a deliberate pivot. After managing architectural projects across India and leading a $720K portfolio spanning commercial, educational, and residential spaces, I realised that the escalating urban and climate crises I witnessed could not be solved at the building scale alone.
Now completing an M.Sc. in Smart and Sustainable Cities at KFUPM (GPA 4.0/4.0), I combine architectural spatial thinking with satellite remote sensing, GIS, and machine learning to build evidence-based heat adaptation tools for the Arabian Peninsula.
Whether driving innovation in a research lab, a spatial data consultancy, or a municipal smart city team, I bridge the gap between technical data science and the physical realities of urban design.
There's a reason all my work circles back to the same thing: the planet is getting hotter, and cities are making it worse. Urban Heat Islands aren't a niche academic curiosity — they are a measurable, preventable cause of heat deaths, worsening air quality, and mounting energy demand in some of the world's most vulnerable communities. That bothers me. A lot.
Everything I've built — the satellite pipelines, the GIS vulnerability frameworks, the IoT dashboards — is oriented toward one goal: making urban climate data actionable, not just publishable. That means getting it to the right resolution, the right people, and in time for it to matter.
From architectural BIM to real-time satellite pipelines, all converging on one question: how do we make cities survive the climate crisis?
Built on a Design Science methodology, this near-real-time digital twin platform transforms retrospective urban climate studies into live decision-support tools. Monitors multi-city thermal variations across five Saudi climate zones and urban typologies across Riyadh, Jeddah, Dammam, Makkah, and NEOM, combining satellite feeds with demographic layers to deploy an equity-focused Heat Vulnerability Index that prioritises interventions in underserved residential communities.
Three papers produced in one M.Sc. year — building toward a peer-reviewed publication record for doctoral research.
I’m actively looking for fully funded PhD positions in urban climate informatics, smart city analytics, and GIS-based climate adaptation, particularly in the UK, EU, North America, and the GCC. If you’re working on heat resilience, digital twins, or spatial data for sustainable cities, I’d love to connect. Also open to smart city research roles and GIS consultancy in KSA.
shibliafaq4@gmail.com