- 4 Aug 08, 01:42 PM
This is my third trip to Beijing in the last two years and I'm still shocked by the sheer size of the city - and, most of all, by the millions of cars on the streets.
The Chinese authorities have introduced traffic restrictions which will take half of the 3.3 million cars off the roads during the Olympics in efforts to solve the capital's chronic air pollution problem. But it still feels busy.
There are still major doubts about how distance athletes are going to cope if the air is too polluted.
But London can't be complacent about its air for the 2012 Games, either.
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Air quality experts at King's College, London - who monitor the capital's ozone levels and pollution closely - have told me that athletes in 2012 could encounter health problems if we have a repeat of the hot summer of 2003.
Jenny Jones of the Green Party at the London Assembly was far more blunt. She says London is simply not going to match the promises it made about air quality when it was bidding for the Games.
London is a long way from suffering the problems I encountered in Beijing last November, when I felt ill after a morning walking around a smog-filled city. But, if the Greens are right, Britain has still got a lot of work to do to make sure the world's athletes have perfect conditions in 2012.
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Comments
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not the best of articles, there are no facts to compare our levels to beijings etc.
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Agree with comment #1. There are detailed facts available as to pollution levels, surely the journalist can include a few as reference points.
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Several before and after photos of Beijing's air quality, plus an article: "Pollution curbs turn Beijing into urban laboratory": Perhaps IOC Jacques Rogge Will Listen After all to Requests to Remove Marathon, Triathlon, and Cycling out of Beijing's Smog, As We have Asked for the Past Six Weeks! Several will die and all will be affected mitochondrially the rest of their lives!
also, an earlier article about Australia: BOTH ARE POSTED AT TRANSWORLDNEWS.COM
Stephen Fox, Managing Editor Santa Fe Sun News
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Dear Adrian
Congratulations for drawing attention to London's serious air quality problems.
The UK is currently breaking air quality laws for particulate matter (so called PM10) in London. Without new measures from Mayor Johnson and the government (such as an additional, inner Low Emission Zone), London is expected to be breaking them in 2011 and well beyond.
The other air pollutant covered by air quality laws in the UK is a toxic gas called nitrogen dioxide (NO2) which is usually worse near London's busiest roads (where it averages two to three times the maximum level recommended by the World Health Organisation) than in Beijing!
Unless serious action is taken in London, the UK looks set to breach the Host City Contract for London 2012. The Green Party in London has done much excellent work investigating the potential problems for London 2012. I commend their work to you and your readers.
Simon Birkett
Principal Contact, Campaign for Clean Air in London
ps for those wanting more details, I suggest they look at the London Air Quality Network website and that of the Beijing Environmental Bureau. People should note that the scale used by the Chinese is an index for a range of underlying actual average daily measurements whereas the LAQN shows actual measurements. The BBC's measurements, taken over a 10 minute period, give an indication of air quality.
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your latest report on £2m London house in Beijing..... if you get any slower delivering your report I'll fall asleep.
It didn't sound, to me, to be a non-judgemental report. Perhaps you could have compared it to what other countries are paying for the same reasons which may have given the report a more reasonable slant. Tessa Jowell didn't do too well either. What a shame
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