Residential Traffic and Children’s Respiratory Health

Abstract

BackgroundLiving near traffic has been associated with asthma and other respiratory symptoms. Most studies, however, have been conducted in areas with high background levels of ambient air pollution, making it challenging to isolate an independent effect of traffic. Additionally, most investigations have used surrogates of exposure, and few have measured traffic pollutants directly as part of the study.ObjectiveWe conducted a cross-sectional study of current asthma and other respiratory symptoms in children (n = 1,080) living at varying distances from high-traffic roads in the San Francisco Bay Area, California, a highly urbanized region characterized by good regional air quality due to coastal breezes.MethodsWe obtained health information and home environmental factors by parental questionnaire. We assessed exposure with several measures of residential proximity to traffic calculated using geographic information systems, including traffic within a given radius and distance to major roads. We also measured traffic-related pollutants (nitrogen oxides and nitrogen dioxide) for a subset of households to determine how well traffic metrics correlated with measured traffic pollutants.ResultsUsing multivariate logistic regression analyses, we found associations between current asthma and residential proximity to traffic. For several traffic metrics, children whose residences were in the highest quintile of exposure had approximately twice the adjusted odds of current asthma (i.e., asthma episode in the preceeding 12 months) compared with children whose residences were within the lowest quintile. The highest risks were among those living within 75 m of a freeway/highway. Most traffic metrics correlated moderately well with actual pollutant measurements.ConclusionOur findings provide evidence that even in an area with good regional air quality, proximity to traffic is associated with adverse respiratory health effects in children.

A rapid assessment of the impact of hazard reduction burning around Sydney, May 2016

“…In most studies published after the 2009 EPA integrated science assessment, (total) organic carbon has been found to be associated with short-term changes in cardiovascular (Delfino et al, 2010a;Ito et al, 2011;Kim et al, 2012;Son et al, 2012;) and respiratory health (Kim et al, 2008), or with changes in the levels of inflammatory markers (Hildebrandt et al, 2009). …”

“…Many studies have shown excess health risks in proximity to roads -after adjustment for a range of possible confounders, including socioeconomic status -for such outcomes as: cardiovascular mortality (Gehring et al, 2006), respiratory mortality and traffic intensity in a 100-m buffer (Beelen et al, 2008a), myocardial infarction (Tonne et al, 2007), cardiovascular disease (Hoffmann et al, 2006), coronary artery calcification (Hoffmann et al, 2007), cardiac function-left ventricular mass index (van Hee et al, 2009), asthma (Morgenstern et al, 2007(Morgenstern et al, , 2008Gauderman et al, 2005;McConnell et al, 2006a;Gordian, Haneuse & Wakefield, 2006;Kim et al, 2008), wheeze (McConnell et al, 2006a;Ryan et al, 2005;Venn et al, 2005;Gauderman et al, 2005;van Vliet et al, 1997), asthma hospitalization (Edwards, Walters & Griffiths, 1994;English et al, 1999;Lin et al, 2002;Wilhelm et al, 2008), lung function reduction (Sekine et al, 2004;Kan et al, 2007;Gauderman et al, 2007;Schikowski et al, 2007), birth weight (Brauer et al, 2008), childhood cancer (Savitz & Feingold, 1989;Pearson, Wachtel & Ebi, 2000), and lung cancer (Beelen et al, 2008b). Therefore, the observed excess risk in proximity to roads cannot solely be explained by socioeconomic status; although associations between traffic proximity and health impacts have been observed in locations where both high and low socioeconomic status occur in close proximity to roads (Généreux et al, 2008), its influence cannot be ruled out.…”

Characterizing Urban Traffic Exposures Using Transportation Planning Tools: An Illustrated Methodology for Health Researchers

“…Traffic density has been estimated at the county level, 5 the census block level, 44 and within selected radii (50-300 m) of a residence 10,11,30 using publically or commercially available sources or some combination thereof. The traffic density estimate may be based on only those roads for which actual traffic volume data are collected, 11,44 or traffic volumes may be assigned to neighboring roads using models or comparison to roads with similar capacities.…”

“…Studies that use proximity as a surrogate for near-roadway exposures often use a dichotomous exposure variable for living inside or outside a specified buffer zone of a roadway. Buffer distances typically range between 50 and 300 m. 30,35,36,40 Traffic-level data layers were developed to include 100-and 200-m buffers measured from the edge of roadways with traffic volumes over 20,000 vehicles per day. Centerline data for the buffers were based on the MassGIS Executive Office of Transportation roads data layer.…”

Investigating the relationship between environmental factors and respiratory health outcomes in school children using the forced oscillation technique

“…Exposure to traffic-related air pollution has been associated with the prevalence and exacerbation of asthma and respiratory symptoms in children (Brauer et al 2007;Gehring et al 2010;Gordian et al 2006;Kim et al 2008;McConnell et al 2006;Nordling et al 2008). …”