Clear The Air

Provo (and the greater Provo area) is regularly listed at the top of a variety of published rankings. We don't need to be told that Provo is a great place to live, but it is still nice to hear every once in a while. Our majestic mountains contribute significantly to our great quality-of-life. These mountains, though, can also be a curse when they trap our own emissions in the local air shed. Unfortunately, even though we don't pollute as much as many other places, our mountains make it so we sometimes top a more troublesome list: places with the worst air quality.

Our bad air has a major negative impact on our quality of life. Poor air has been linked with shortness of breath and chest pain, wheezing and coughing, increased risk of asthma attacks, hospitalization and even premature death. Our air quality can also be a deterrent to good people and good companies from locating or staying here.

There are many steps that can be taken to improve our air quality. Some of them are controversial. But everyone can get behind efforts of individual citizens to reduce our own impact on our air quality.

The Clear the Air Challenge is a contest held by UDOT's Travelwise campaign, in partnership with UCAIR, and sponsored by the Salt Lake Chamber. Participants are asked to consider how they can reduce their single-occupancy vehicle (SOV) trips, and then log how many SOV trips they didn't take. There are more details when you sign up, but you can reduce SOV trips by walking, biking, car-pooling, trip-chaining, e-commuting, taking public transit, or just skipping the trip.

So I propose that we form a team and work together on this Challenge. I've registered the team under the name, Neighbors 4 Dave - Provo 5. After you sign up for the challenge you can join the team. (It is possible to join multiple teams and have your SOV trip reductions count towards each team.)

It can be a bit tedious to log the trips, but overall this is a fun way to get us thinking about (and acting) how we can reduce our impact on our local air shed.

There is a silver-lining to our hazy air, trapped by our mountains: we should be more aware than most people that we breathe what we emit. Most people don't get such a visible reminder that our actions have a real impact on our environment. Join with me this month in reducing our vehicle-produced smog. Let's see if we can fall a few notches in the list of places with the worst air.