ASSESSMENT OF THE RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN AIR QUALITY AND SOCIO-ECONOMIC FACTORS IN SHEFFIELD, UK USING GIS

Recently increased concerns in air quality issues have led to the demand for more thorough and accessible information As the fourth biggest city in England, Sheffield is constantly striving to improve air quality in the city The aim of this study is to investigate the relationships between air pollution, and selected socio-economic factors in Sheffield GIS (Geography Information System) technique was adopted to produce a set of interactive air quality maps Integrated with a freeware namely GMapCreator, thematic GIS maps were published on a working Google Maps web-site for public information The air quality scores consisted of the concentrations of four air pollutants, whilst fourteen socio-economical factors were selected from official database It is shown that the air quality in Sheffield has close relationships with a number of socio-economic factors, and the correlation coefficients are generally high With worse air quality in a Sheffield neighbourhood, fewer young people tend to enter higher education, and more adults are likely to obtain low qualifications or even no qualification at all, which is also associated with the considerably lower income levels There might be more people who suffer from mood or anxiety disorders, and more emergency admission to hospitals Comparative illness and disability ratio also tends to be higher in the neighbourhoods with worse air pollution It is expected that the results of this study will benefit members of the public with health problems worsened by pollution, promote local community to tackle the environmental inequalities and make a contribution to the sustainable development of Sheffield