Digital Proceeding Of THE ICOEST2013 - , Cappadocia

C.Ozdemir, S. ahinkaya, E. Kalpc, M.K. Oden (editors)

Nevsehir, Turkey, June 18 21, 2013

The Effect of Green Infrastructure in Mitigating Air Pollution in

Urban Area, Case Study Tehran-Iran
N. SHAKOURI*1, M.E. BARIS2
1, 2
Landscape Architecture Department, Ankara University, Turkey.
(E-mail: nasim.shakouri@gmail.com, ebaris@ankara.edu.tr)

Abstract

Nowadays, population growth and rapid urbanization are two major determinants causing many environmental problems in
urban ecosystem. Air pollution is one of these environmental problems which is expressed in many researches as a main
problem in megacities in developing countries. Therefore, in this article, Tehran; capital of Iran as one of the mega cities
facing with air pollution problem is evaluated.

During the last few decades, many researchers identify the sources of the air pollution in Tehran. Consequently, many
strategies and solutions have been implemented by Tehrans Municipality and other organizations. Unfortunately, these
strategies were not effective in reducing air pollution up to now. Therefore in this paper, the concept of urban Green
infrastructure is discussed as a sustainable solution for improving air pollution problems in cities. Many researches indicate
that planning Green infrastructure has positive effect on the environmental problems in cities. Specially, Green infrastructure
techniques have significant role on improving air quality.

Based on these data, in this article the concept of urban Green infrastructure is defined. Accordingly, the effect of the Green
infrastructure on air quality of cities is discussed. Also, this paper uses the case study of Tehran for clarifying the positive
impacts of Green infrastructure on urban air pollution.

It must be noted that result of this research indicate that in the case of air pollution, Green Infrastructure offsets air pollution
by directly removing pollutants from the air and reducing the high temperatures and sunlight that contributes to ozone
formation. Also, it can mitigate the UHI effect in urban area and indirectly improve the quality of air in cities. In the case of
Tehran air pollution, planning Green infrastructure not only can be effective in improving air quality but also it can protect
public health and reduces illness-related to air pollution in urban area.

Keywords: Air quality, Air pollution, Green infrastructure, Public health, Vegetation.

1. Introduction

Nowadays, population growth is the main reason causing rapid urbanization in many
countries. In parallel with such a rapid urbanization, many environmental problems are
emerged affecting the urban ecosystem. Air pollution is one of the most important
environmental problems that large number of cities around the world are faced with it. The
reason is that air pollution not only effect the urban ecosystem but also have negative impact
on livability and quality of life in urban area.
Over the past few years, many research investigated the components of the urban air
pollution and their resources. The result of these research indicates that major pollutants in
urban areas are carbon monoxide (CO), nitrogen oxides (NO2), ozone (O3), volatile organic
compounds (VOCs), sulphur dioxides (SO2) and particulate matter that are generally caused
by vehicle emissions, power production, industry and aviation. In addition to these research,
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different methods of decreasing the air pollution in urban area have been evaluated. Also,
many urban management program such as traffic control plans have been carried out.
However, most of these practices cannot have remarkable effect on reducing the air pollution.
Considering these facts, in this article the concept of Green Infrastructure have been evaluated
as an effective method for mitigating the air quality in urban area.
Green infrastructure (GI) refers to the network of living green spaces that play a
fundamental role in improving climate change, public health, biodiversity and community
cohesion [5]. Also, green infrastructure is related to environmental or sustainable goals that
cities are trying to achieve through a mix of natural approaches [7].
Unfortunately, for a long time, communities that planned for green space inside the
cities primarily thought about preserving land for residents recreation or visual beauty of
cities. Therefore, parks and green areas were often viewed as a community amenity, an extra,
even a frill [3]. Now, Green infrastructure can link the parks and green areas not only for
recreation and benefit of people but also for improving the air quality.
Green infrastructure is a system of hubs and links. Hubs are variety of natural and
restored ecosystems and landscape features and links are the connections tying the system
together and enabling green infrastructure networks to work.
Research indicates that green infrastructure system facilitates the incorporation of
trees and vegetation in urban landscapes, which can contribute to improved air quality. The
plants and soils that are part of the green infrastructure approach serve as sources of carbon
sequestration, where carbon dioxide is captured and removed from the atmosphere via
photosynthesis and other natural processes. In addition, trees and vegetation absorb certain
pollutants from the air through leaf uptake and contact removal [7].
For instance, there are evidence representing the ability of trees and woodlands in
absorbing the significant quantities of gaseous pollutants such as SO2, NOx, VOCs and ozone
from the atmosphere. Whereas the proportion of the pollutants that are absorbed depends on
different factors such as tree species, environmental conditions, pollutant concentration in the
atmosphere and etc. In addition, the production of oxygen during photosynthesis operations
has a positive impact in improving the air quality.
If the green infrastructure plan is apply in urban design; widely planted throughout a
community, trees and plants can even cool the air and slow the temperature-dependent
reaction that forms ground-level ozone pollution. The result of the research on formation of
pollutants represent that twelve percent of air pollution in urban areas is attributable to the
urban heat island effect, due to temperature dependent formation of pollutants such as VOCs
and O3. Therefore, the planting of street trees can have positive impact on reducing air
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temperature in urban areas which can also have a significant effect.

Based on these facts in this article the effect of urban green infrastructure is evaluated
in Tehran; capital of Iran as a case study. The reason of choosing Tehran as a case study is
that air pollution become a major environmental problem in the capital of Iran.

Figure1. Air pollution blanketed the skyline of Tehran by Thomas Erdbrink.

During the last few decades, many researchers identify the sources of the air pollution
in Tehran. Consequently, many strategies and solutions have been implemented by Tehrans
Municipality and other organizations. Some of these strategies are as follows:
Expanding green spaces surrounding the street network
Constructing pedestrians in commercial areas of the city
Imposing new duties for vehicles according to fuel consumption and emissions
Unfortunately, these strategies were not effective in reducing air pollution of Tehran
up to now. Therefore in this study, the concept of urban Green infrastructure is discussed as a
sustainable solution for improving air pollution problems in this city.

2. Material and Methods

The special geographical position of Tehran, its rich resources of water and mild
climate, it was an important point for population settlement over the past years. The
topography of city influence the spatial texture of the city that is a reflection of its social-
geographical topography as well.
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Figure 2. The sprawl of Tehran (from left to right between the year of 1974-2008).

Population growth, rapid urbanization and excessive pressure on the natural resources
of the city caused various bio-environmental problems in urban ecosystem. Air pollution is
one the important environmental problems that Tehran is faced with during the last few
decades. Natural factors, urban structure layout, more than 2 million active vehicles, five
hundred thousand motorcycles, five thousand industrial units (25% of countrys total
industries) with the 20% consumption of countrys energy [1] are some reasons influencing
the air quality. For this purpose in this study, the data of the air quality of Tehran investigated
in last decade and the main source and regions of the air pollution is determined. Additionally,
the quality and quantity of urban green and open areas in each district of Tehran is evaluated.
Accordingly the concept of Tehran Green infrastructure is discussed to mitigate the air
pollution and improve the air quality in the city.

3. Results and Discussion

Nowadays Tehran with more than 11.5 million resident is one of the most polluted
city in the world. The research indicate that the presence of thousands industrial units, the
traffic flow of nearly two million active moving vehicles and the daily gas consumption of
approximately nine million liters are some of important reasons effecting the air quality of
city [11]. In addition to these factors, the air inversion phenomenon generally occurs during
the fall and winter because of air stability. As a result, air is polluted more than the standard
limit in most of the days.
The evaluation of the air pollution contributions in Tehran represent that natural
topographic conditions as well as anthropogenic sources are two important component
effecting the air quality. Briefly, source of the air pollution in Tehran can be categorized
under two heading:
Stationary sources including residential dwellings, power plants, and industrial
complexes
Mobile sources are comprised of public and private light and heavy vehicles
Also, research indicate that approximately 90% of air pollution caused by mobile
resource and the rest by stationary resources.
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3.1 The Air Pollution Components and Distribution in Tehran

Result of the research of Torkiyan et al. indicates that more than three fourth of the
pollutants weight in Tehran is CO with 98.7% being contributed from vehicles; about half
from Light Duty Vehicles (LDVs) and 20% from motorcycles. HC and NOx with 11.4% and
8.4% of total weight are next in the line, with 70% and 67.5% contribution from mobile
sources. SO2 has 2.9% of the total weight, 85.8% of which is emitted from stationary sources.
TSP comprises 2.4% of the total weight.
n another research pollution components are measured and categorized according to their
resources (Table 1-2-3)

Table 1. Emission of pollution in the industrial sector (kg. per day)

Table 2. Emission of pollution from commercial sources in Tehran (kg. per day)

Table 3. Degree of pollution of three types of vehicles

Research of the air pollution distribution in Tehran represent that in general the
northern, western and eastern districts of Tehran have relatively good environmental
condition and air pollution is effects mostly in the central, southern and south-eastern districts
of city [1].
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Figure 3. The map of districts of Tehran.

Figure 4. The air quality and level of pollution (2006)

3.2 Tehran Green and Open Areas

Open and built areas are two main elements of the structural organization of the city. The
macro level control of the urban design programs effect the citys overall spatial organization
as well as the quantity and quality of its construction activities, the emerging proportion of the
built area to available space, and the quality of its visual corridors and city vistas. Generally,
the proportion of open and built spaces are different in various districts of Tehran [1].
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The open and public spaces of Tehran can be divided as follows:

Green spaces (including urban parks, urban forest, farmlands, gardens and orchards);
Roads and accesses (including highways, major and minor streets and road lanes);
Reserve lands of urban services (including old factories, warehouses and uncultivated
lands)
An assessment of Tehran constructional areas illustrate that central part of city and the
southern half of the city are densely populated due to the small size of the residential units.
The density in this region is almost twice as much as the average density of Tehran. District
22 has the most and districts 7, 8 and 17 have the least areas of open and public spaces. In
districts 14, 7, 8 and 17, the area devoted to buildings is far greater than the area devoted to
public and open spaces [1].
Open, green and public spaces are evenly distributed among all districts in Tehran. The
historical development of the city has effective role in established patterns of available open
urban spaces, and the distribution of industrial, military and services sectors in various
districts of the city.
In addition to open areas, the evaluation of Tehran green areas represent that, there are
two kinds of green areas in Tehran as hubs: urban and forest parks. Forest parks are usually
located outside of the city but urban parks are located inside [1].

Figure 5. Situation and dispersion of inner-city parks and forests (2006) [1].

The main factor on planning of the parks in Tehran is maximum number of people
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who can use them. But since certain parts of the city, especially the districts in the southwest,
are so densely populated, it has not been possible to plan large green areas in these parts.
Also, the evaluation of the Green areas location indicate that the majority of Tehrans large
parks are located near two intersecting roads (north-south and east-west). Table 4 illustrates
the open areas quantity comparing to built-up areas in Tehrans district.

Table 4. Green spaces, public spaces and streets compared with built-up areas in Tehrans
district

As stated above, the result of the research on the distribution of the air pollution
components and the green areas in Tehran indicate that the areas of city with more green and
open areas comparing with the areas covering with the constructional components have better
condition of air quality. On the other hand, concentration of green areas along the north-south
and east-west axes caused that the other part of the city have been deprived of the advantages
of the green areas in improving the air quality and decreasing the air pollution.
Based on these facts planning the green infrastructure in the city will improve the
system of green areas in city as well as air quality.
Research of the urban ecology emphasize that the first step in integrating plant
ecology into design of cities is to make a structural assessment of urban areas. Like any
ecological study, the understanding of urban ecological systems is concerned with structure,
function, dynamics and their relationships [10]. Therefore, for planning the green
infrastructure of the city and mitigating the air pollution; analysis of the quality and quantity
of the green areas and their relation with each other in each district and their connection in
city as whole is important.
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In the case study of Tehran because of the high density of constructional areas in
districts with air pollution problems innovative strategies for planning the green infrastructure
and increasing the green areas quantity in city is a significant factor. For example, using the
green roof technology or converting the impermeable surfaces to permeable ones are some of
these methods for creating linkage between the hubs and large green areas. Also, green ways,
green alleys and streets, role should not be ignored.
In spatial analysis of the network of urban services of Tehran, there are coherent and
hierarchical networks which mainly depend on the urban highways network. The network,
which links various urban spaces, offers access to various center of urban services. These
networks can have significant role in planning the green infrastructure in city. Majority of
Tehrans large parks, especially forest parks, are located alongside these road that can
improve the green infrastructure plan in the city.
Considering the important role of the planting of vegetation in street canyons and
their impacts on reducing street-level concentrations by as much as 40% for NO2 and 60% for
PM, planting the trees or increasing the trees number in the roadside can have positive
impacts on connecting the green areas and improving the air quality of city. Street-level air
quality improvements can be gained through action at the scale of a single street canyon or
across city-sized areas of canyons as a part of green infrastructure. Thus, judicious use of
vegetation in street canyon can create an efficient urban pollutant filter, yielding rapid and
sustained improvements in street-level air quality in dense urban areas [9] with the lack of the
green and open spaces.

Figure 6. Planting of vegetation in street canyons and their impacts on reducing street-level
concentrations
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4. Conclusion

Green infrastructure benefits will be achieved most successfully if green space

creation and management are integrated with more traditional land development and built
infrastructure planning. In the case of mitigating the air pollution, planning the green
infrastructure can offsets air pollution by directly removing pollutants from the air and
reducing the high temperatures. Also, it can mitigate the UHI effect in urban area and
indirectly improve the quality of air in cities.
In the case of Tehran air pollution, planning Green infrastructure not only can be
effective in improving air quality but also can have positive impacts on public health and
reduces illness-related to air pollution in urban area. Therefore, comprehensive research is
needed on the effect of green infrastructure on pollution, air quality, noise, energy
consumption and flood mitigation to encourage the government to apply these plans in their
city planning strategies. Furthermore, economic evidence on the cost benefits of green
infrastructure on air quality improvement is required to make green infrastructure planning to
be the first step in developing land-use plans as communities grow and urbanization expand.

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