St Bede pupils mark National Clean Air Day
As part of National Clean Air Day Winchester City Council raised awareness of the issue by asking St Bede Primary School to run a ‘No Idling’ poster campaign.
The winning entries were chosen to create posters which will be displayed at the school gates and around the city to raise the public’s awareness of air quality and, particularly, to encourage drivers to reduce their impact by turning off their engines whilst stationary.
The winners of the poster campaign were Isla in Year 2 who won a day out to Marwell Activity Centre, and Bella in Year 4, who won a family ticket to Winchester Science Centre for the Clean Air Exhibition.
Portfolio Holder for Environment, Cllr Jan Warwick, said:
We all take our right to clean air for granted and yet we all contribute to the pollution problem when we drive to school and work every day.
Winchester city centre currently has a designated air quality management area and the council is taking steps to bring our air quality here into compliance with national standards by 2020.
We need to ask that everyone does their bit to achieve this goal by reducing their personal impacts and choosing alternative less polluting modes of transport, such as buses, trains, cycling and walking.
Winchester Action on Climate Change and the council marked the day with a Clean Air Workshop at St Peter’s Church in Jewry Street.The workshop focused on the causes of air pollution, its impact on health, and levels of air quality as well as what the city council is currently doing and what everyone can do to help.