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Mapping the vertical distribution of population and particulate air pollution in a near-highway urban neighborhood: Implications for exposure assessment

Abstract

Owing to data collection challenges, the vertical variation in population in cities and particulate air pollution are typically not accounted for in exposure assessments, which may lead to misclassification of exposures based on elevation of residency. To better assess this misclassification, the vertical distribution of the potentially highly exposed population (PHEP), defined as all residents within the 100-m buffer zone of above-ground highways or the 200-m buffer zone of a highway-tunnel exit, was estimated for four floor categories in Boston’s Chinatown (MA, USA) using the three-dimensional digital geography methodology. Vertical profiles of particle number concentration (7–3000 nm; PNC) and particulate matter (PM2.5) mass concentration were measured by hoisting instruments up the vertical face of an 11-story (35-m) building near the study area throughout the day on multiple days. The concentrations from all the profiles (n=23) were averaged together for each floor category. As measurement elevation increased from 0 to 35 m PNC decreased by 7.7%, compared with 3.6% for PM2.5. PHEP was multiplied by the average PNC for each floor category to assess exposures for near-highway populations. The results show that adding temporally-averaged vertical air pollution data had a small effect on residential ambient exposures for our study population; however, greater effects were observed when individual days were considered (e.g., winds were off the highways).

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Acknowledgements

The Community Assessment of Freeway Exposure and Health (CAFEH)25 study, which contributed data and analytical support, is funded by NIEHS grant #ES015462. We acknowledge Chad Milando and Caitlin Collins for assisting in the data collection efforts. We also acknowledge the support of the Chinatown Progressive Association (CPA) to double-check the spatial patterns of residential polygons recorded in the property parcel database.

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Correspondence to Chih-Da Wu.

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Wu, CD., MacNaughton, P., Melly, S. et al. Mapping the vertical distribution of population and particulate air pollution in a near-highway urban neighborhood: Implications for exposure assessment. J Expo Sci Environ Epidemiol 24, 297–304 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/jes.2013.64

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