The Environmental Classroom: Learning Beyond Harvard Yard
Two students gain practical experience while studying the air quality at Boston subway stations
Last fall Ruma Neogy and Bambi Corrigan, two women with a vested interest in environmental issues, either professionally or personally, found their way to the Extension School’s introductory course on environmental management. Both Neogy, a senior environmental consultant, and Corrigan, a laboratory chemist, were interested in investigating today’s most pressing environmental issues and applying what they learned beyond the classroom. They found the opportunity to do both, performing research in the field that could have a lasting impact.
As part of the course, each student conducted a research project on air or water quality. Co-instructors George Buckley and Jack Spengler mentored students and provided training in use of the equipment. Spengler—director of the Extension School’s environmental management program and Akira Yamaguchi Professor of Environmental Health and Human Habitation at Harvard School of Public Health—initiated the study that brought Neogy and Corrigan together. After talking with Galen Moore, a reporter for the former BostonNow newspaper, Spengler invited the journalist into the classroom to share his interest in researching the air quality conditions of various public transportation systems in Boston.
A few years back, concerns over poor air quality at Back Bay station had received minimal media coverage, but Moore says no action resulted. To raise public awareness about the sub-par ventilation at the station, Moore needed help.
Neogy volunteered to take Moore’s proposal on as her class assignment. Although Corrigan had already completed her own project, she offered to assist Neogy and Moore aggregate and synthesize the data. According to Moore, “it was a little out of the ordinary as a journalist to be so closely involved in something like this, but it certainly seemed appropriate. As a start-up newspaper, we didn’t have the resources to commission someone to do this sort of thing, but as an issue that is of interest to both students and newspapers and their readers it’s certainly a good way to collaborate.”
Corrigan’s passion and Neogy’s experience served this project well. Corrigan is an avid environmentalist—friends refer to her as “Greenie”—who faithfully composts her trash and plants trees to reduce the impact of her carbon footprint. Neogy has a master’s degree in environmental engineering from the University of Cincinnati and enjoys conducting research. For this project in particular, she aimed to study whether people face greater health hazards when commuting by public transportation instead of by car.
The team used a TSI P-Track ultrafine particle (UFP) counter to collect data along 11 commuting routes for four modes of transportation: subway, bus, aboveground commuter rail, and car. For seven days, during morning and evening rush hours, Corrigan and Moore assisted Neogy at various sites. The data collected at the Back Bay station proved particularly alarming: air quality on the station’s commuter rail platform was nearly four times worse than on the busy downtown streets tested. The enclosed platforms recorded an average of 248,000 ultrafine particles per cubic centimeter (pt/cc); along the streets at rush hour, the P-Track recorded averages of 69,000 pt/cc.
Route 1—Harvard to Back Bay via Subway
Ultrafine Particle Count in a Subway Travel (Route 1)
Beginning with a baseline in Harvard Yard, Neogy and Moore traveled from Harvard to Back Bay station on the Red, Green, and Orange Lines, testing the air quality and taking average particle counts along the platforms and aboard the trains. The noticeable spikes in ultrafine particles per cubic centimeter occur in the Back Bay commuter rail waiting area and platform, as well as the Back Bay Orange Line platform.
Although the Environmental Protection Agency does not currently regulate UFP emission levels, researchers interviewed by BostonNow in 2007 confirmed that counts over 100,000 are considered extremely high. The effects of UFPs on the human body are an increasingly hot topic in the research community. Recent studies suggest significant exposure may lead to respiratory illnesses such as asthma and heart disease. Moore says that commuters and rail workers at Back Bay have complained of nausea, headaches, and coughs from the smog and smoke that often hang in the air, and that at the time of the research the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority acknowledged that the station’s ventilation system had deteriorated.
According to Moore, there was a plan to rebuild the ventilation system, but because necessary funding has yet to be secured, the initiative is on hold. “So there’s no end in sight for anyone who is commuting through Back Bay and is concerned about that exposure,” Moore says. “At the time, they did have an answer, which seemed satisfactory, but perhaps some kind of follow-up is warranted.”
Both Corrigan and Neogy are interested to see if students in this fall’s Environmental Management class will conduct a follow-up study. Corrigan says the issue is significant enough to make a strong thesis topic. “People deserve to know about this,” she says. She believes that such pollution issues need to be addressed because they affect the sustainability of neighborhoods.
Spengler commends Neogy, Corrigan, and Moore for calling attention to the poor air quality at Back Bay and for raising awareness of the need for proper ventilation systems. He says their work is “an example of how we try to steer student projects to relevant environmental issues in their communities so that the information they research and report can make a difference.”