How clean Is the air you breathe? Air quality during commuting using various transport modes in Nottingham

Air quality has developed into a significant global issue and its negative effect on human health, wellbeing and ultimately the effect of shortening of life expectancy is becoming a pressing concern. Such concerns are most acute in cities in the UK. Although many cities, including Nottingham, are taking significant measures to enhance air quality, there was limited work focusing on the individual’s experience during commuting. This paper suggests a novel approach for measuring commuting air quality through quantifying particulate matters PM2.5 and PM10, using the city of Nottingham as a case study. Portable low-cost systems comprising of a GPS sensor and an Aeroqual pollution data logger were used to capture data and develop the sensor fusion via newly developed software. Data was collected from a variety of transport modes comprising bike, bus, car, tram and walking to provide evidence on relative particulate levels and 2D and 3D data maps were produced to communicate the relative pollution levels in a publicly accessible manner. The study found as expected particulate pollution to be higher during peak hours and typically closer to the city. However whilst the lowest particulate concentrations were found on the Tram the highest were for cyclists contrary to the literature. The project encompasses a democratic crowd sourced approach to data collection by enabling the public to gather data via their daily commute, increasing people’s awareness of the air quality in their locality. The acquired data permitted a range of comparisons considering differing times of day and zones such as the city centre and surrounding residential areas in the City council boundary.