Monitoring shows San Salvador's air pollution problems
Air quality monitoring by El Salvador's Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources confirmed that air pollution remains a serious health issue in San Salvador. The Ministry recently issued a report on air quality levels for 2006. Tragically, the area with the highest levels of nitrogen dioxide and particulate pollution was in the area around the city's maternity hospital. The report also disclosed the level of particulates in the air throughout all monitored areas rose "very considerably" from the measures in 2004 and 2005.
A 2005 study found unhealthy levels of volatile organic compounds created by motor vehicle exhaust in San Salvador's air.
Respiratory ailments caused by air pollution is a serious health issue for children in and around San Salvador
A 2005 study found unhealthy levels of volatile organic compounds created by motor vehicle exhaust in San Salvador's air.
Respiratory ailments caused by air pollution is a serious health issue for children in and around San Salvador
Comments
...can you say...
...untuned, unfiltered, obsolete diesel engines used by the bus industry?
ahhh! yes! the same ones used by the politically powerful bus industry. The ones who get a subsidy by virtue of not paying FOVIAL whereas everyone else does.
He he. Talk about unintended consequences. Keep the stuff cheap, so it is more economic to have inefficient diesel engines than to tune them up.
Brilliant!
Thank for this posting.
the problem is related to urban planning.
The Hospital you mention is located near a big avenue.
If you visit other countries, sometimes you realise the level of precaution the urban planners had already place as a measure to isolate hospital from heavy trafic that create air and sound pollution.
In our country such consideration are not taken place, urban development in El Salvador is not a consecuence of mature planning but chronic disorganization
The other side of it is that the economy hinges on cheap labor who can only show up for work with cheap mass transit. The huge question is how do you fix the problem and still have cheap mass transit. Raising bus fares by a few pennies here is a huge deal.
what el salvador needs is a metro rail system very similar to the one used in los angeles. other major latin american cities such as caracas, santiago, buenos aires and mex. city have one. in fact it could even become, potentially, a national mass transit system given the diminute size of our beloved el salvador. the passenger wagons should glide, or rather slide on electric cables which would power them. anyway, the goal here is an electric metro rail system for el salvador!
The riders can only afford to pay a pittance. The present system costs about a quarter and many are angry that it costs that much. In the U.S. rail systems have required huge tax outlays and still lose money. Those tax dollars to fund light rail don't exist here.
If you take away the pollution and the crazy motoristas, the mass transit system here works remarkably well. You can catch a bus, microbus or even a pickup almost anywhere in the country and at least in the city you won't wait very long. It doesn't cost the government a ton of money, and it moves huge amounts of people somewhat efficiently.
But you still have the pollution. It's a huge problem that now manifests itself in high rates of asthma in children, but should eventually lead to even higher rates of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease in people middle aged and older at some point in the future. We don't see that yet because the pollution hasn't been that bad for a long enough period of time, but unless something changes that should be inevitable.
It may not actually be solvable by the Salvadoran government, FMLN or Arena, but have to be solved by someone somewhere coming up with a cleaner and cheaper source of fuel for transportation. That may well be the only realistic solution for this problem.
You know, back in the 1920's, when cities such as São Paulo or Los Angeles or SAN SALVADOR or San Francisco were poorer than today's San Salvador, they all had mass transportation:
The electric trolley
All of them had it built courtesy of private enterprise. Governments back then did not spend a single cent to have these privately funded and operated systems.
Of course, neither they stiffle transportation (sorry, I meant "regulate") by mandating prices nor hours nor requiring kneeling transports for the elderly nor requiring special seats for the disabled.
How much we have lost since. How many people now get sick with diesel smoke because enterprise can no longer trust their investment in mass transportation will be safe from politicians.
- * -
San Salvador's non-polluting, electric trolley system opened on October 15th, 1920.
It was private.
mass transit is the way to go for large urban areas and of course the bus companies are corrupt
in ES as in ALL latinolandia, the norm is 'fix it when it breaks'
maintainence is not too much the norm
diesels should have the valves adjusted every 10K miles or so and put a litter of automatic transmission fluid in the tank every 20 tanks
then again bio fuels [the best is HEMP seed oil]should start to be utilized,NOT coen nor sugarcane!!!!!
out the exhaust is CO2 and H2O, NOT SO2 and NO2 corrosive gases
and the trolley system would be more apropo
amazing making ther fishermen pay FONVIAL[this has changed recently] and the bus companies with theior rag ass buses NO??
oh well, El Salvador
love it, love the people however not a lick of common sense
and people in power that care???
yea when hell freezes over
etc.