Evaluation of the Public Health Impacts of Traffic Congestion

A new study by Jonathan Levy, Jonathan Buonocore and Katherine von Stackelberg focuses on the public health impacts of traffic congestion:

"Traffic congestion is a significant issue in urban areas in the United States and around the world.  Previous analyses have estimated the economic costs of congestion, related to fuel and time wasted, but few have quantified the public health impacts or determined how these impacts compare in magnitude to the economic costs. Moreover, the relative magnitudes of economic and public health impacts of congestion would be expected to vary significantly across urban areas, as a function of road infrastructure, population density, and atmospheric conditions influencing pollutant formation, but this variability has not been explored....In this study, we evaluate the public health impacts of ambient exposures to fine particulate matter (PM2.5) concentrations associated with a business-as-usual scenario of predicted traffic congestion....Our analyses indicate that the public health impacts of congestion may be significant enough in magnitude, at least in some urban areas, to be considered in future evaluations of the benefits of policies to mitigate congestion."

Read the study at this link.