Over the last fifty years, a compelling body of international evidence has emerged suggesting a causal link between exposure to airborne particulate matter (PM) and adverse health consequences. Automated recording of personal travel has recently been revolutionised by the advent of light-weight, low-cost, portable, Global Positioning Systems (GPS) data loggers. Such devices are able to record and store second-by-second positional and velocity information to accuracies of a few metres, which can later be integrated within Geographical Information Systems (GIS), permitting powerful spatial analysis and display options. The other intrinsic appeal of GPS is that it can be linked to any device, which provides data by time, permitting those data to then be referenced spatially. This provides the rationale behind the current study, namely that combining GPS and a portable pollution monitor provides a simple method for collecting such data and permits analyses at a highly disaggregate temporal and spatial level. (a) For the covering entry of this conference, please see ITRD abstract no. E213716.
Abstract