Health & Place 13 (2007) 249–260 Place and the experience of air quality Rosemary Day à Department of Urban Studies, University of Glasgow, 29 Bute Gardens, Glasgow, Scotland G12 8RS, UK Received 23 June 2005; received in revised form 5 January 2006; accepted 6 January 2006 Abstract This article examines how concepts of place effects are relevant in understanding the public’s experience of air pollution. Using qualitative and quantitative data from a case study of four neighbourhoods in north London, the analysis shows how this experience is mediated by multiple aspects of place, which may be seen as overlain. These multiple aspects also provide routes to inequalities in the experience of air pollution. Working with these understandings of the relevance of place could provide ways to mitigate the experience of pollution, and to address environmental health inequalities. r 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Keywords: Air pollution; Public perceptions; Environmental equity; Environmental risk; Therapeutic landscapes; Geography Introduction Air pollution is not evenly distributed. Measure- ment and modelling of air pollution concentrations demonstrate its uneven distribution, and can be mapped to describe how this relates spatially to population characteristics (e.g. Brainard et al., 2002; Morello-Frosch et al., 2001; King and Stedman, 2000). Modelling and mapping techniques also form the basis for planning local air quality management measures in the UK (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, 2000). Such techniques however tell us little about how air pollution is experienced, or how and why this experience may be unequal, beyond an assumed relationship with distribution. An approach grounded in human geography can help to illuminate the more complex ways in which place is important in the construction and experience of air pollution. Research on perceptions of air quality has often found that perceived levels of pollution do relate well to physically measured levels (Bladan and Karan, 1976; Wall, 1973; Thouez and Singh, 1984; Zeidner and Schechter, 1988). However, this may not provide a full picture, and social scientists have further been interested in how other social and geographical influences may be implicated in the formation of such perceptions and related concerns. Early survey work explored some possibilities, with mixed results. Some suggested habituation could occur with higher or longer term exposure (Kromm, 1973; Thouez and Singh, 1984) though others did not (Medalia, 1964); higher concern was related by some, but not all, to higher class/socio-economic status (Medalia, 1964; Zeidner and Schechter, 1988). Later work incorporating a greater variety of methods turned towards examining the effects of wider physical and social characteristics of ARTICLE IN PRESS www.elsevier.com/locate/healthplace 1353-8292/$ - see front matter r 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.healthplace.2006.01.002 à Tel.: +44 141 330 3150; fax: +44 141 330 2095. E-mail address: r.day@socsci.gla.ac.uk.