Is there any rule for the average temperature change per X miles traveled north or south like the rule for altitude?
— Arthur Lyons, Chicago
The "altitude rule" to which you are referring is the lapse rate, the rate at which air temperature decreases (or lapses) with increasing altitude. That decrease ranges from about 5.5 degrees per 1,000 feet upward in clear air to 3 degrees per 1,000 feet in saturated air (100 percent relative humidity). The lapse rate rule is applicable everywhere — in the tropics, in mid latitudes like Chicago or at the North Pole — because air pressure decrease with altitude is uniform...