One othe trick was to build houses close to each other with narrow streets between them, so they would be in the shade of buildings most of the time. This way the city can actually be cooler than the open area around it.
Of course this won't work anymore with large modern glass buildings or wide roads between them.
The problem with that is it leaves little space for vegetation and soil, which give an outdoor evaporative cooling effect. The narrow streets approach should be combined with vegetated rooftops. An perhaps the vegetation should be able to thrive in the shade of solar panels.