A Breath of Fresh Air: How Data and Design Can Fight City Pollution
By Jacqueline Barr
日期
2017年7月24日
空气污染对公众健康有重大的负面影响，影响着我们大多数人, 每一天. In large cities, such as Beijing and London the problems can be more obvious, but mostly it remains an invisible danger.
Quantifying the impacts of air pollution is extremely difficult. In 2010, 英国卫生部空气污染物医学影响委员会（COMEAP）报告说，长期暴露在室外空气污染中导致大约29人死亡,000 UK deaths in 2008.
Even more worryingly, in 2016, 英国皇家内科医学院的一份报告显示，每年的死亡人数可能接近40人,000人死亡, 世界卫生组织（世卫组织）报告说，污染对公众健康造成的不利影响使英国经济每年损失超过500亿英镑.
重要的固定污染源与工业和能源生产有关, along with other combustion processes and agriculture. 然而, given the increasing global urban population, estimated by the UN to reach 60% by 2030, transport emissions (specifically, 二氧化氮和颗粒物是影响人类健康的最重要的空气污染源.
理解、测量、建模和预测空气污染是复杂的. Urban pollution episodes can occur around calm, 干, settled conditions allowing pollution to build-up around busy roads; or episodes can be caused by long-range transportation of pollutants from sources thousands of miles away, such as volcanic eruptions, Saharan dust or forest res. 城市地理也对街道峡谷的循环和捕获污染起到了一定作用, and steeper hills requiring greater vehicular acceleration, creating more harmful pollution.
What’s being done?
In recognition of the scale of the problem, 世界各国政府都致力于更严格的空气质量监管和监测, 通过支持采用低排放和零排放燃料和技术来减少运输排放, reducing the volume of heavily polluting vehicles, promoting a modal shift away from the car through active travel, designing urban spaces to reduce pollution, and reducing the need to travel.
智能交通系统（ITS）有机会在应对空气质量挑战方面发挥重要作用. 有效管理空气质素，减少空气质素超标情况, 能够实时准确地监测和预测空气中有害道路交通污染物的浓度是十分必要的.
A project I have been involved in with Transport Scotland examined this concept; testing new, lower-cost air quality monitoring equipment, deploying it at various roadside locations, then analyzing the data in parallel with traffic and meteorological data. 最终目标是开发一个系统，从多个来源收集和整合空气质量和交通数据, and build this into a decision support tool to model, 预测, manage and inform the environmental impact.
Information services can have a positive impact too, providing current and 预测ed air quality levels, 以及鼓励人们在日常出行选择中做出更可持续改变的服务, 比如IBI一直在为爱尔兰国家旅游局工作的“主动旅行记录器”项目. 通过更容易理解的路线图，可以支持清洁公共交通成为可行的替代方案, clearer information at stops, prices and how to pay.
ITS is also an important element of Low Emissions Zones (LEZs) and Clean Air Zones. 城市越来越多地使用这些方法来帮助减轻交通污染的负面影响. 首个LEZ于1996年在斯德哥尔摩推出，即指定区域采取有针对性的行动来改善空气质量, with hundreds now in place around the world. In the UK and Ireland, IBI has worked on projects such as London Congestion Charging, Mersey Gateway and the M50, 都柏林, 让我们深入了解车辆进出监控和执法的运作情况.
In terms of design we can look to a wide range of options including: building ventilation systems; orientation of building and roads to the prevailing wind; landscaping to encourage walking; the careful positioning of public transport stops and taxi ranks; and safe, efficient walking/cycling routes away from the roadside.
What’s the vision for the future?
We want urban areas to be enjoyable and healthier places, where people want to live, work and visit; balancing the needs of all. 这需要在各个层面采取一系列支持和补充措施——从个人做起, 企业, to local authorities and government initiatives and investment. The challenges and questions for all parties, whether road operators, consultants or solutions providers, appears to be three-fold, but in all cases, require us to examine air quality at a micro rather than macro level.
