Green spaces and pollution

October 22, 2020

Green spaces and pollution

Green spaces

In Peckham, there are limited green spaces. There are many benefits to green space including reducing pollution, reducing depression, and help your physical health. With there being a reduced amount in the area this is not good for people living nearby. I have drawn a map of how far a park/ large green space is away from the centre.

The Orange arrows represent 15-minute walk, the blue arrows equal 20 min walk and the purple arrow are 25 minutes or more.

There is no park closer than 15 minutes away from the center, this is really bad for air quality in this area. It also means that a child would have to walk 15 minutes or more to go to a local park. Often children over a certain age go to the park by themselves, this could be dangerous having to go this far away from home if they hurt themselves at the park and needed help.

Homeowners want to walk outside of their homes and be able to see greenery and have a place to take their children to play outside. Peckham needs some serious measures in place to help improve its green zones in the town center.

On the left is a chart showing the number of green areas in Peckham, Portsmouth, and Greater London. Compared to the rest of Greater London, Peckham green area is very minimal nearly none existent. We should be in harmony with nature not less than 5% in a major city. This definitely needs to be a key feature when redesigning the city.

Pollution

Pollution is a major problem within cities today, it impacts our health and our planet.

Air quality impacts are health by causing premature deaths. In the UK around 36000 people die a year as a result of air pollution. This has increased by 7000 since 2015.

It happens by prolonged exposure to chemicals us as polycyclic, aromatic, and hydrocarbon, which can generate health problems. Young children and older adults are particularly vulnerable. Children/young adults take up nearly 30% of Peckhams's population. COMEAPs reported that by reducing the number of traffic pollutants in the air we breathe it would save the UK 754,000 deaths over the next 50 years.

How does pollution impact our planet?

-Creating poisons soil so our crops won't grow

-Causing forest fires until there is no more forest left

-Heating up our planet until it unliveable for humans

Benefits of improving air quality in Peckham

-Slows down climate change

-Reduces the cost of building maintenance and cleanliness of an area

-Reduced the overall temperature of the city

-Helps with people health

How we reduce pollution

-Stop allowing as many cars in the centre of Peckham

-Make more bike lanes and bike space to encourage people to cycle into central London instead of drive

-Add more green spaces to the city to help suck up the CO2 in the atmosphere

How can green spaces and trees help with pollution?

Urban green spaces help relieve the effects of pollution in cities by the leaves of the trees capturing the CO2 and releasing oxygen. Having large spaces of trees on the ground and rooftops can help to decrease the overall temperature of the city by shading it from the sunlight

Stefano Boeri designed the "vertical forest" city in China that eats up smog. It is a great example of a future city that will eat up the pollution that we have made in the past. The whole city is covered in trees and plants, all over the buildings and either side of the paths. We need to take some ideas from this example for our future city to Peckham, to help fight London’s pollution problem.

· Adding a layer of vegetation to rooftops and creating green roofs have proven to reduce the urban heat island effect.

Having soil, plants, and greenery on our roofs would both reduce surface temperature and serve as insulation for the structures below, reducing the energy needed to heat and cool the buildings. Green roofs can also help regulate rainwater, trapping it as it falls and filtering out pollutants.

· Adding more trees to the streets can have an effect, increasing the ecosystem species, attracting birds and insects. In turn, the animals help regulate the plants, and less maintenance is required on the plants and trees for upkeep.

Heat Island Effect

As cities are developed there is a lack of vegetation because of paved surfaces and a lack of airflow because of cars and industry. This causes the area to heat up. The urban heat island effect is where the temperature is higher in over-developed areas. Solutions for decreasing the temperature of the area is to increase the vegetation which can absorb CO2 and shield heat-absorbing pavements and spaces should be designed with airflow in mind.

Benefits of green spaces in an urban area

-Encourage residence to exercise, providing a place to walk, run, cycle without having to share the pavement with pedestrians, commuters, and the busy hassle.

-Can provide space to socialize with people outside in nature.

-Reduce noise pollution.

-Give people space to practice mindfulness

-Workspaces overlooking greenspace will improve the worker's mental health.

How can we add more green space to Peckham

Ways in which we could add more green zones to the center.