In an increasingly urbanized world, air pollution mitigation is considered one of most important issues in city planning. Urban trees help to improve air quality by facilitating widespread deposition of various gases and particles through the provision of large surface areas as well as through their influence on microclimate and air turbulence. However, many of these trees produce wind‐dispersed pollen (a known allergen) and emit a range of gaseous substances that take part in photochemical reactions – all of which can negatively affect air quality. The degree to which these air‐quality impacts are manifested depends on species‐specific tree properties: that is, their “traits”. We summarize and discuss the current knowledge on how such traits affect urban air pollution. We also present aggregated traits of some of the most common tree species in Europe, which can be used as a decision‐support tool for city planning and for improving urban air‐quality models.

We recommend you cite the published version. The publisher's URL is http://dx.doi.org/10. 1016/j.envpol.2009.05.005 Refereed: Yes This is a preprint of an article published in Environmental Pollution c 2009 ?copyright Elsevier?. Environmental Pollution is available online at: http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journa Disclaimer UWE has obtained warranties from all depositors as to their title in the material deposited and as to their right to deposit such material. UWE makes no representation or warranties of commercial utility, title, or fitness for a particular purpose or any other warranty, express or implied in respect of any material deposited. UWE makes no representation that the use of the materials will not infringe any patent, copyright, trademark or other property or proprietary rights. UWE accepts no liability for any infringement of intellectual property rights in any material deposited but will remove such material from public view pending investigation in the event of an allegation of any such infringement. AbstractThe role of vegetation in mitigating the effects of PM 10 pollution has been highlighted as one potential benefit of urban greenspace. An integrated modelling approach is presented which utilises air dispersion (ADMS-Urban) and particulate interception (UFORE) to predict the PM 10 concentrations both before and after greenspace establishment, using a 10 x 10 km area of East London Green Grid (ELGG) as a case study. The corresponding health benefits, in terms of premature mortality and respiratory hospital admissions, as a result of the reduced exposure of the local population are also modelled. PM 10 capture from the scenario comprising 75 % grassland, 20 % sycamore maple (Acer pseudoplatanus L.) and 5 % Douglas fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii (Mirb.) Franco) was estimated to be 90.41 t yr -1 , equating to 0.009 t ha -1 yr -1 over the whole study area. The human health modelling estimated that 2 deaths and 2 hospital admissions would be averted per year. CapsuleA combination of models can be used to estimate particulate matter concentrations before and after greenspace establishment and the resulting benefits to human health.

National climate policies across Europe and their impacts on cities strategies ABSTRACTGlobally, efforts are underway to reduce anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions and to adapt to climate change impacts at the local level. However, there is a poor understanding of the relationship between city strategies on climate change mitigation and adaptation and the relevant policies at national and European level. This paper describes a comparative study and evaluation of cross-national policy.It reports the findings of studying the climate change strategies or plans from 200 European cities from Austria, Belgium, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Spain and the United Kingdom. The study highlights the shared responsibility of global, European, national, regional and city policies. An interpretation and illustration of the influences from international and national networks and policy makers in stimulating the development of local strategies and actions is proposed. It was found that there is no archetypical way of planning for climate change, and multiple interests and motivations are inevitable. Our research warrants the need for a multi-scalar approach to climate policy in the future, mainly ensuring sufficient capacity and resource to enable local authorities to plan and respond to their specific climate change agenda for maximising the management potentials for translating environmental challenges into opportunities

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The success of a mass roll out of electric vehicles (EVs) is largely underpinned by establishment of suitable charging infrastructure. This paper presents a geospatial analysis exploring the potentials for deployment of publicly accessible charging opportunities based on two traits -one, trip characteristics (journey purpose and destinations); two, availability of adequate charging (space and time). The study combined census statistics indicating lifestyle trends, family size, age group and affordability for an administrative region in the North-East England to identify three categories of potential EV users -'New Urban Colonists', 'City Adventurers' and 'Corporate Chieftains'. Analyses results indicate that Corporate Chieftains, primarily residing in peri-urban locations, with multi-car ownership and availability of onsite overnight charging facilities form the strongest group of early adopters, irrespective of public charging provision. On the other hand, New Urban Colonists and City Adventurers, primarily residing in the inner-city regions, show potentials of forming a relatively bigger cohort of early EV adopters but their uptake is found to be dependent largely on public charging facilities. For effective EV diffusion, catering mainly to the demands of the latter group, development of a purpose-built public charging infrastructure -both for provision of on-street overnight charging facilities in residential locations and for fast charging at parking hubs (park and ride, amenities and commercial centres) is recommended for prioritisation in order to overcome the limitations of non-availability of private off-street parking to these users.