Cyclists gather pollution data in Inverness
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CLEAN air campaigners have strapped pollution sensors onto their bikes to expose the city’s toxic air hotspots.
The Highland Cycle Campaign is working with a student-led research project from Cambridge University to monitor air quality near roadways because of fears official figures are not capturing “dangerous” levels of pollution.
So far six members have used the £60 monitors in various areas including the A82 trunk road.
And there are plans to extend its reach to the rest of the Highlands.
Secretary Anne Thomas, who acts as local co-ordinator for Friends of the Earth Scotland, said the devices are showing where the most polluted areas are.
She said: “The first maps show pollution levels on Academy Street and at the Longman roundabout as particularly high.”
And she claimed that the levels did seem, in some cases, to be breaching standards “which should have been met in 2001”.
She added: “In reality there is no safe level of pollution which is responsible for thousands of premature deaths a year across Scotland.”
Mrs Thomas hopes the findings inspire more people to cycle as studies show car drivers spend longer in toxic air than walkers or cyclists on main roads.
