City-dwellers, if you didn’t already love your trees, here is another reason for you to become a treehugger. Researchers of the University of Leicester have found that trees are vital for improving the quality of air that we breathe in our cities. They have a measurable impact on pedestrians, by reducing ambient concentrations of road traffic emissions. The study shows the trees do this by dispersing pollutants. It was also found that trees reduce wind speeds, but at the same time produce turbulence in these winds that helps disperse pollution, lowering the exposure that pedestrians face. Besides pollution, trees are well known to reduce stress. With cities increasingly growing around the world, these new findings are of great importance in the future of urban planning.
Scientists explain the impact of urban trees on air quality: They decrease pollution levels
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