Poorest New York City subway riders endure more pollutants, study says
Platforms and train cars have “high concentrations of fine particulate matter” that are known to lead to respiratory, cardiovascular and neurological disorders and diseases, according to the study. Credit: AP/Cedar Attanasio
New York City’s poorest subway passengers are exposed to the most pollutants in the transit system due to longer commuting times to their jobs, according to a new study.
Platforms and train cars have “high concentrations of fine particulate matter” known as PM2.5 that are known to lead to respiratory, cardiovascular and neurological disorders and diseases.
“Those particles are small enough that they penetrate the lung tissue and enter the bloodstream, and hence the toxicity,” said New York University professor of urban systems engineering Masoud Ghandehari, who co-authored the study, published Aug. 7, in the journal PLOS ONE.
In a statement sent by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority press office, spokesman Tim Minton said: "This recycled ‘study’ based on years-old ‘data’ has long since been debunked. Every serious person knows transit is the antidote to climate change, the one reason NYC is the greenest city around, and an engine of equity for people of all communities who need an affordable, safe way to get to jobs, schools and opportunities of every kind."
Minton said that “100% of subway cars have MERV 8-9 filters, with two air conditioning units per car that generate refreshed and filtered air every 3-4 minutes.”
In response to the MTA’s responses, Ghandehari said the study had not only not been debunked but in fact has been published in a peer-reviewed journal and samples were collected over the prior three years. He said that despite air filters installed in the train cars, the particulate concentrations are still at seven times the World Health Organization guidelines.
Ghandehari's research is among the latest to document pollution in the world’s underground metro systems. In 2021, an NYU study found that the city’s subway system exposes passengers to more inhaled pollutants than any other metro system in the northeastern United States.
Those researchers sampled air quality at dozens of stations in the city, Boston, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C., and found that the concentrations of organic particles and hazardous metals were between 2 and 7 times higher than outdoor samples.
In the study Ghandehari co-authored, to measure the prevalence of PM.2.5, his team measured nearly every station and line in New York City — 19 subway lines and 608 subway station platforms located in 429 stations.
The sources of the matter include the abrasion of metal wheels on the rails and the brakes.
“This stuff, the particles, this metal dust, has been accumulating in the bottom of these tunnels for years,” he said, adding: “Gotta clean, gotta clean this stuff.”
“It just keeps accumulating, every time a train goes by, a little more dust settles, steel dust settles,” he said.
He called the presence of the particles “a serious public hazard,” noting that the pollution affects not just commuters but transit workers, police officers and others in the system.
It’s possible, he said, that some stations are more polluted than others because of the station depth, braking distance that needs to be exerted, or curvature of the tracks.
The mean value of the particulate matter in the stations is nearly 200 micrograms per cubic meter, 100 in subway cars. The guidelines set by the World Health Organization are a mean over 24 hours of 15.
Ghandehari and his co-authors, using computers and information from the U.S. Census Bureau, analyzed the likely routes that commuters take from home to work, and calculated likely exposure based on commuting length to those jobs.
“Usually, lower-income individuals live farther away — not all — but in general,” Ghandehari said.
Certain types of stations and trains have lower concentration of the matter. For example, trains that are outdoors, on elevated platforms, see the levels go down to nearly 1/10th.
“It gets cleared out by winds,” he said.
As for Ghandehari, his commute is only one stop — from Bowling Green to Borough Hall, where the NYU Tandon School of Engineering is located.
“When I get out of the train and onto the platform,” he said, “I hold my breath before I come out.”
New York City’s poorest subway passengers are exposed to the most pollutants in the transit system due to longer commuting times to their jobs, according to a new study.
Platforms and train cars have “high concentrations of fine particulate matter” known as PM2.5 that are known to lead to respiratory, cardiovascular and neurological disorders and diseases.
“Those particles are small enough that they penetrate the lung tissue and enter the bloodstream, and hence the toxicity,” said New York University professor of urban systems engineering Masoud Ghandehari, who co-authored the study, published Aug. 7, in the journal PLOS ONE.
In a statement sent by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority press office, spokesman Tim Minton said: "This recycled ‘study’ based on years-old ‘data’ has long since been debunked. Every serious person knows transit is the antidote to climate change, the one reason NYC is the greenest city around, and an engine of equity for people of all communities who need an affordable, safe way to get to jobs, schools and opportunities of every kind."
Minton said that “100% of subway cars have MERV 8-9 filters, with two air conditioning units per car that generate refreshed and filtered air every 3-4 minutes.”
In response to the MTA’s responses, Ghandehari said the study had not only not been debunked but in fact has been published in a peer-reviewed journal and samples were collected over the prior three years. He said that despite air filters installed in the train cars, the particulate concentrations are still at seven times the World Health Organization guidelines.
Ghandehari's research is among the latest to document pollution in the world’s underground metro systems. In 2021, an NYU study found that the city’s subway system exposes passengers to more inhaled pollutants than any other metro system in the northeastern United States.
Those researchers sampled air quality at dozens of stations in the city, Boston, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C., and found that the concentrations of organic particles and hazardous metals were between 2 and 7 times higher than outdoor samples.
In the study Ghandehari co-authored, to measure the prevalence of PM.2.5, his team measured nearly every station and line in New York City — 19 subway lines and 608 subway station platforms located in 429 stations.
The sources of the matter include the abrasion of metal wheels on the rails and the brakes.
“This stuff, the particles, this metal dust, has been accumulating in the bottom of these tunnels for years,” he said, adding: “Gotta clean, gotta clean this stuff.”
“It just keeps accumulating, every time a train goes by, a little more dust settles, steel dust settles,” he said.
He called the presence of the particles “a serious public hazard,” noting that the pollution affects not just commuters but transit workers, police officers and others in the system.
It’s possible, he said, that some stations are more polluted than others because of the station depth, braking distance that needs to be exerted, or curvature of the tracks.
The mean value of the particulate matter in the stations is nearly 200 micrograms per cubic meter, 100 in subway cars. The guidelines set by the World Health Organization are a mean over 24 hours of 15.
Ghandehari and his co-authors, using computers and information from the U.S. Census Bureau, analyzed the likely routes that commuters take from home to work, and calculated likely exposure based on commuting length to those jobs.
“Usually, lower-income individuals live farther away — not all — but in general,” Ghandehari said.
Certain types of stations and trains have lower concentration of the matter. For example, trains that are outdoors, on elevated platforms, see the levels go down to nearly 1/10th.
“It gets cleared out by winds,” he said.
As for Ghandehari, his commute is only one stop — from Bowling Green to Borough Hall, where the NYU Tandon School of Engineering is located.
“When I get out of the train and onto the platform,” he said, “I hold my breath before I come out.”
Matthew Chayes, a Newsday reporter since 2007, covers New York City.
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