car/air problem

CATCH News – June 28, 2011

Local air pollution mainly vehicles

Clean Air Hamilton says emissions from transportation are the main cause of local air pollution, and is advising city councillors that they should do something about this. In a special section added to their annual report, the city-funded group specifically “recognizes that strong linkages exist between planning decisions and the resulting air quality in cities.”

Chair Dr Brian McCarry says progress has been made in Hamilton air quality, but problems remain with both premature deaths and hospitalizations attributable to the air local residents breathe. And while about half of the pollutants originate in the United States, most of the rest can be reduced by local actions.

“Almost all the oxides of nitrogen … almost all the carbon monoxide, and SO2 , and most of the particulate material are locally generated,” said McCarry. “We have responsibility for those cars, trucks, industries, our lifestyle that contribute to that.”

While acknowledging local industrial pollution, he told the general issues committee the Hamilton “is primarily a motor-based city” not much different from Toronto. This means that “there are a lot of areas of the city that get very little industrial impact, and they are hit primarily, by car and truck emissions” and this is especially true for people living near major arterial roads who get “much higher exposure to these kinds of pollutants”.

Mobile monitoring studies, for example, have shown pollution levels ten times higher at major intersections than on residential streets as little as 200 metres away. McCarry went on to stress “that urban planning decisions made around this council table have direct impacts long term on air quality” and that it is “critical” for councillors to recognize this and act accordingly.

“When you say we're putting in a subdivision here, that subdivision is going to be there in 50 years,” he noted. “The kind of walkable cities that have been talked about in the economic summit is the kind of thing we've been talking about for some time and we think this is a critical issue and an opportunity for this city to step forward.”

A major achievement noted by McCarry has been the establishment of the Hamilton Air Monitoring Network – a linked collection of 17 company-operated monitoring stations that provide real-time air quality data on-line, and make Hamilton “the best monitored city in the country”. Clean Air Hamilton also supports tree planting, participates in sustainable transportation programs, and organizes the biennial Upwind Downwind Conference.

Mayor Bratina asked if city air was improving, and McCarry said it was “incrementally”, but a major problem is ozone arising from coal-fired power stations in Ohio which produce 83 percent of that state’s electricity. He also agreed with the mayor that Hamilton’s air is not significantly worse than other parts of southern Ontario, but argued that action is necessary, pointing to the improvements obtained in Portland Oregon by the establishment of light rail transit.

CATCH (Citizens at City Hall) updates use transcripts and/or public documents to highlight information about Hamilton civic affairs that is not generally available in the mass media. Detailed reports of City Hall meetings can be reviewed at hamiltoncatch.org. You can receive all CATCH free updates by sending an email to http://hamiltoncatch.org/newsletter/?p=subscribe. Sharing links are available on the hamiltoncatch.org.

PMP 2002

SUSTAINABLE CYCLES (Hamilton, Monday, July 29, 2002)

Report on the Parking Meter Party and Esso leaflet
by Transportation for Liveable Communities.

In the relentless afternoon sun and heat, the sidewalk chalk almost melts into the pavement as a succinct message is scratched onto the asphalt entrance at the Esso station at Main and Leland: "STOP SMOG."

For 40 minutes people hand out leaflets about smog and Esso's attempts to discredit the Kyoto Protocol, the international treaty on global warming which the U.S. has refused to join.

Greenpeace is calling for a boycott of ESSO (ExxonMobil in the U.S.)

The majority of people are happy to receive the information, along with a free bike-route map for the Hamilton region.

One customer suggests going after Ontario Power Generation (formerly Ontario Hydro) for their coal burning power plants in Nanticoke, which he describes as "a disgrace."

He is told about a peaceful protest last year at the Corporate Offices of OPG in Toronto where several people were arrested and criminally charged for demanding that OPG convert from burning coal to cleaner natural gas.(their trial is in Toronto in September)

One woman receives the leaflet on Esso, scans it, and decides to go elsewhere to fill up. A boycott is begun.

No one disputes the fact that humans are seriously messing up the air with hyper-consumption lifestyles.

One driver refused to accept any information. He apparently complained to Esso staff who finally ordered the leafletters off the property, tersely giving them a "one minute" warning and threatening to call the police.

The threat happened to coincide with the need to depart for a soon to begin Parking Meter Party just a few blocks away organized by local transportation activists in Transportation for Liveable Communities (TLC).

TLC arranged the party to welcome a dozen members of the Cycling for Sustainability crew who had just arrived in Hamilton on their way across Canada.

About 30 people gathered to share food, listen to music, play hackey sack, decorate the asphalt's oil and grease stained ugliness with colourful sidewalk chalk, and hear a premierC4S recitation of Dr. Seuss's environmental tale" The Lorax."

As bicycles displaced cars in the parking spaces, people stopped by to say hello and share food with the C4S cyclists and take a leaflet.

C4S's Kevin Hamilton explained that they are hoping to raise awareness about simple steps people can take to live sustainably on the earth. They are cycling their message from coast to coast from Victoria B.C. to St John Newfoundland. On the way they encounter people in various communities putting sustainability into practice in their daily lives.

Yet even in the enjoyable atmosphere of people gathered in community to celebrate the possible future of sustainable living, the poisoned atmosphere of the current state of air quality lent a sense of urgency to the message.

1,900 people in Ontario go to early grave each year due to smog-related respiratory problems according to the Ontario Medical Association, 110 of them in the Hamilton area. Transportation accounts for 27 percent of greenhouse gas emissions in Canada as well as being the single largest source of air pollution in the country, according to stats from Environment Canada.

While the message about air pollution gets into the news, (the day after the parking meter party the Hamilton Spectator ran a story on air quality, reprinted below) positive grassroots actions such as these by C4S and TLC are largely ignored by the corporate-owned media in Hamilton.

Yet it is citizens' actions that are necessary if we are to survive in a tolerable, liveable, breathable world.
The message? Don't wait for someone to do it for you, organize your own street party, a walk to school program, car-share club or car pool. Try the bus, bike, or walk to some of your destinations. Call your city councillor and tell them to make clean alternatives like the HSR bus service more available instead of cutting back - tell them to stop planning on paving the Red Hill Valley or the Mid Pen Highway. Write a letter to the editor in your local paper. Be the change you want to see!