A Route to School Informational Intervention for Air Pollution Exposure Reduction

TL;DR

This study developed and tested an informational intervention encouraging school children’s guardians to choose routes with lower air pollution, resulting in significant route changes and potential health benefits.

Contribution

The paper introduces a novel route to school intervention that effectively promotes cleaner routes using behavioral strategies and real-time pollution data.

Findings

60% of participants adopted cleaner routes

Average NO2 difference of 10 μg/m3 between routes

77% of participants switched routes after intervention

Abstract

Walking and cycling are promoted to encourage sustainable travel behavior among children and adults. School children during their travel episode to-and-from school are disproportionately exposed to air pollution due to multiple reasons such as proximity to high traffic roads and peak volumes. This paper presents a route to school informational intervention that was developed incorporating approaches and methods suggested in the literature for effective behavioral interventions. The intervention was implemented using escorting parents/guardians (N=104) of school children of Antwerp, Belgium to adopt school routes with least exposure to pollutants. Collected data and its analysis revealed that 60% participants (N= 62) could benefit themselves by adopting the suggested cleanest routes to school, of whom a significant proportion of participants (i.e. 34%, N= 35) have a difference of average NO2 concentration between the alternative and current route of around 10{\mu}g/m3. This information about alternatives routes with their potential benefits was presented to each participant via defined study protocols. 18 Based on the feedback of participants that could potentially adopt suggested alternatives, 77% (N=48) have switched their routes. These results indicated that intervention was effective, and it can bring higher benefits when implemented on a wider scale.