We Can Breathe Better – An Insight into Manchester’s Air Pollution Crisis
Manchester has a dirty secret.
It’s not a marketing ploy for the vibrant nightlife in the Northern Quarter, or fantastic coffee shops from New Islington to Chorlton. It’s not how fantastic it is to live within roughly 2 hours of London, Birmingham, Liverpool, Newcastle, or Leeds, alongside the beautiful Peak District and Lakes to the North.
It’s our air, and it’s killing us.
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Air pollution is a real crisis. That word might be increasingly easy to brush over in a time when every day our news talks of the collapse of social care, cost of living crisis, climate crisis, dental deserts, energy crises and failing train operators. Yet in all 10 boroughs of Manchester, air quality breaks legal limits (R6). Manchester is covered in air pollution monitors that regularly record figures above WHO guidelines, despite there being no “safe level” of exposure to particulate or other air pollution (R9). Amongst the 42 cities in Europe ranked by the Clean Cities Campaign, Greater Manchester ranks as the worst for air pollution- below Birmingham, Bucharest, and Krakow to name but a few (R13).
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All of this has unescapable impacts to our health. Air pollution contributes to 1,200 deaths a year in Greater Manchester, at a cost to our health services of ￡5.2bn (R2). Which for the record is ￡5,200,000,000. Furthermore 1/3rd of deaths from stroke, lung cancer, and heart disease are caused by air pollution (R2). At a national scale, this has put Manchester and Salford in the top 10 local authorities for emergency admissions and death rates for lung conditions (R14). For our young people the effects of this are clear. Greater Manchester has the highest proportion of children hospitalised for asthma in the country, and the number of children admitted to hospital in Manchester for respiratory conditions has doubled in the past 2 years (R9). We deserve better. Our children, our future deserve better.
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As an asthmatic myself, I know the heavy feeling on the lungs when I go for a run through the city on a high-pollution day. I am constantly aware of the fumes I breathe and feel and smell as I walk from my central apartment to work. The buzz of internal combustion engines on inner city streets as you sit outside for a beer or coffee with friends, and the coughs and tight throats that can follow. My air purifier buzzes in my bedroom as I try to do all that I can to mitigate against the risks.
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We suffer awful consequences because of the air we breathe. An activity no person chooses yet requires and cannot escape. So why do we feed into the system that chokes us? The 2021 national census showed that driving a car or van remains the most common method of travel to work in Greater Manchester, despite these travel distances reducing since the last census (R4). Burning dirty fuel in our Internal Combustion Engines, on congested roads in densely populated cities, is not a viable future.
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It is natural to wonder what our politicians, our elected representatives, are doing about this. The evidence is so clear and astounding that political momentum must be on the side of our people and our health. To this end, the Council agree that air pollution is a problem, and have put limited measures in place to tackle it. They admit that “some” roads have high levels of air pollution, and that this does “affect” people’s health and ultimately lead to early deaths (R1). As such, they are mandated by central government to complete their Clean Air Plan by 2026, which includes a ￡51mn investment in 64 zero-emissions buses, and ￡30.5mn towards a clean taxi fund (R21). Note that this places little emphasis on private car travel, the primary mode of transport for commuters in General Manchester and hence a significant source of air pollution in the city. It is also notable that the Bee Network runs 324 routes, of which 50 have a commitment to zero-emissions buses, and 84 to low-emissions buses (R17). Treating air pollution like the crisis it is requires greater ambition than this.
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For a time, it looked like air pollution control in Greater Manchester would be further-reaching, with the Metro Mayor set to introduce a Clean Air Zone before pausing the development of the scheme in 2022 and U-turning in 2023. The justification for this was to provide more time to reach compliance to legal air quality limits without implementing a charge-based CAZ (R18). The problem is two-fold, this both kicks the can down the road (though at the time of writing, by only 30 more months), and arguably represents a lack of ambition. The UK legal requirement for annual PM10 air pollution is 40ug,/m^3, the WHO’s recommendation is 15 (R19, R20). For annual PM2.5 the legal limit in the UK is 20ug/m,^3 the WHO’s recommendation is 5 (R19, R20). Simply being “in-line” with UK targets and recommendations is not enough to secure healthy futures for the people of Manchester.
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Furthermore, over ￡60mn of taxpayer money was spent on the Manchester Clean Air Zone, despite the scheme never going ahead (R7) and as a result of the U-turn, Greater Manchester is the only city region in England that is legally mandated by the government to clear its air that has not begun charging the most polluting vehicles (R6). The local authority has stated that implementing their investment-led plan will reduce air pollution to within legal limits “faster than a Clean Air Zone” (R1), yet little explanation is given as to why a combination of both cannot be realised. It seems that the city’s plans have shifted from being “all-stick” to “all-carrot”, instead of a balanced approach. A hybrid system, that discourages the most polluting vehicles while raising revenue for further investment alongside existing plans would surely have achieved this. Not to mention the cost savings to be found by reducing the healthcare and lost-work-days cost of our existing high-pollutant environment.
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The need for stronger policies and measures to tackle air pollution is clear. In just over 30 years, the population of Manchester city centre has risen from 500 in 1990 to 100,000 people by 2025 (R3). With a population density of 4,773 people per square kilometre in the city (R4), there is a need to rethink how our urban landscape is designed to function. Never in this region’s history have so many people lived in such a concentrated space amongst high levels of airborne pollutants, which requires us to do things differently. That’s what we’re so good at in the North, right? We look out for each other, and when we see that deprived communities are most likely to live in hubs of air pollution (R10), be they busy roads or industrial areas, we should be compelled to act boldly.
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Oftentimes the scale of the environmental challenges facing us becomes paralysing. Yet if air pollution in Manchester were cut by just 1/5th, then every year 284 fewer children would suffer from low lung function, 5 fewer babies would be born underweight, and there would be a 5.6% decrease in lung cancer rates (R8). While we must commit to the scientifically set ambitions of the WHO, every bit of progress changes lives.
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When everyday people like you and me encourage our political leaders to treat air pollution like an emergency, we can encourage our society to adopt the solutions that it requires. These solutions also tend to have pluralistic benefits that increase our wellbeing and the health of the local environment. For example, promoting active travel alongside accompanying infrastructure improvements can improve our physical and mental health, and shifting from private vehicles to public transport can save personal costs while reducing traffic and congestion. Similarly, implementing more efficient home-heating methods than solid fuel burning can support household finances, increase comfort in our homes and protect us from cold winters while also reducing particulate matter in the air.
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In response to the worsening health and wellbeing impacts of high air pollution, local advocacy groups have also started to call for stronger measures from politicians. The Clean Cities Campaign calls on cities to phase out petrol and diesel vehicles by 2030, and prioritise active, shared, and electric mobility in their decision making (R13). This requires investment to ensure that lower-income households can feasibly transfer to zero-emissions vehicles, as well as a mindset shift to focus on sustainable journeys rather than car-centrism. Another group calling for stronger policies to tackle air pollution is Mums for Lungs. They have called on the mayor to outline a pathway towards air pollution levels that are in-line with WHO guidelines, with clear interim targets to achieve to promote accountability (R15). Specific, targeted measures are also important, as it allows campaigners to push for clear legislation. To this end, the group have asked the authority to commit to increasing the percentage of primary schools with a permanent “school street” (whereby the road adjacent to a school is closed during pick-up and drop-off hours, hence reducing children’s exposure to pollutants) by 25% over the next 5 years (R15).
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The power of nature should also not be understated in the fight against air pollution. Alongside ensuring that our cities are built (or redeveloped) with green spaces, parks, fields and forests in mind, roadside vegetation and green roofs provide innovative solutions to the problem and work through two different mechanisms. Firstly, installing roadside vegetation has been found to immediately reduce airborne particulate matter concentrations at a local scale, with well-designed verges installed at school roadsides found to significantly reduce air pollution in school playgrounds (R12). Again, the multiplier effects are profound, with a positive impact found on wellbeing, noise reduction, and visual appeal (R12). Second, a study at the University of Manchester found that 15% of Manchester city centre and the Oxford Road corridor could adopt green roofs, which would remove 2.3% of PM10 emissions in these areas (R16). The effect of this can be further increased by planting F.ruba grass roofs instead, which were modelled to remove 17.5% of PM10 matter if adopted (R16). These roofs primarily work by reducing background air pollution, whereas roadside vegetation is designed to directly reduce pollutants in a particular area by trapping pollutants near the source. By implementing a combination of these measures, Manchester can help to remove from the air what it cannot reduce.
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Lastly, it goes without saying that to fall in line with the WHO guidelines for air pollution, the authority may be minded to reintroduce plans for a CAZ, at least for the most polluting vehicles in the most densely populated areas. Despite their recent contention, there is proof that these schemes work. Following the introduction of the LEZ in London, PM10 was reduced by 13% from 2008 to 2013, and the further adoption of the ULEZ led Nitrogen Dioxide to fall by 18.4% in Greater London and a substantial 46% in central London in 2019 (R5). In turn there was an 8% decrease in respiratory issues, and a 4.5% reduction in long-term health problems, with nearly ￡1bn of cost savings attributed to the scheme since it was introduced (R5). Imagine if that was replicated in Greater Manchester, a city with worse air pollution than London according to current statistics. Our health, our children’s health, the very air we breathe could be so much better. If our leaders had the vision to combine this with school streets, green roofs, roadside vegetation, and campaigns to phase out solid fuel for household burning then our city could be transformed. Not in a hyperbolic sense, not just words and political slogans, but real tangible benefits to our everyday life.
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Progress is a process. Whether I’ve won you over or not, change takes time, and our local leaders and authority should promote education and awareness as their first step. As an immediate action, individuals and families should be encouraged to walk and cycle, on quieter roads where possible, as air pollution can often be higher inside of vehicles than outside of them (R2). This may go against popular perceptions of drivers and passengers who think they are escaping outdoor pollutants. Similarly, wood burning has increased in recent years due to misconceptions around its affordability and sustainability, so the Greater Manchester authority should run an awareness campaign around the role of wood burning in increasing highly dangerous PM2.5 emissions (R15).
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Moreover, the local authority should aim to communicate that all adults who spend a lot of time in cities are affected by air pollution (R2), this is not just an issue limited to people with pre-existing conditions. Everyone should care about this issue as it genuinely affects all of us, and all of us living in the city of Manchester should speak up and demand better for our communities. To understand the scale of the problem and help mitigate against its impact, Clean Air Greater Manchester also have a text or email alert service to warn people if air pollution in your area is high (R11). This can help us all to adapt our exercise plans, turn on air purifiers, and become more informed citizens to advocate for change.
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Air pollution is not a problem that we should sit back and deal with, nor one we can leave our political systems to simply sort out. It requires us to change our habits, prioritise our health, and create our future. What air do you want to breathe? What health impacts are you prepared to accept? How many deaths should be attributed to air pollution before we act? How any children should be admitted to hospital with breathing issues?
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The time to act, to meet the scale of the crisis, is now. We can breathe better.
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Disclaimer: All opinions my own.
Bibliography
Management Consulting Analyst | Deloitte
4 个月Great read Aaron, really insightful!
Legal Counsel (Commercial)
4 个月A brilliant read Aaron ??
Associate Consultant at Bain & Company
4 个月Really great work Aaron, such an important read!?
First Class BA Politics Graduate at UoW ?? MA Public Policy Student ?? Environmental Policy Analyst ?? 2023 Civil Service DfT Fast Stream Intern ?????? British Youth Citizen of the Year Awardee ?? Ted X Talker ??
5 个月Great work Aaron, thanks for sharing!
Environment Advisor | BASc IEMA (Hons) Global Sustainable Development with Life Sciences
5 个月Such a good piece Aaron! So interesting!