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What started as a University of Washington-led project to measure air pollution near Sea-Tac International Airport has led to schools in the area installing portable air filters to improve indoor air quality. First, UW researchers found they were able to parse aircraft pollution from roadway pollution in the communities under Sea-Tac International Airport flight paths and map…

In early December 2021, PacTrans PI and Professor of Urban Design and Planning at the University of Washington, Qing Shen, and a Graduate Research Assistant in the Interdisciplinary PhD Program in Urban Design and Planning at the Uni246 versity of Washington, Lamis Ashour, delivered a webinar titled, Incorporating Ride-Sourcing Service into ADA Paratransit: Opportunities and Challenges…

On Jan. 19, the non-profit organization ArtsFund released a COVID Cultural Impact Study, an expansive effort to analyze the pandemic’s impact on Washington’s cultural institutions and their role in the state’s communities which ArtsFund believes is “essential.” Arts and cultural venues were among the first to close when COVID hit in March 2020 and often…

University of Washington researchers recently completed an analysis of pharmacy deserts. While the publication is in the review process, Rachel Wittenauer, a Ph.D. student with the university’s CHOICE Institute, said roughly 450,000 adults statewide in both urban and rural areas are living in pharmacy deserts. Pharmacy desert communities are defined as being both low-income and…

A Seattle Times analysis found that among all groups, a disproportionate percentage of trans people were on the brink of poverty, homelessness and starvation. This, in a city where over 10% of the population identifies as queer. As their social determinants for good health plummeted, so has their access to health care, a worrying development as…

As Washington went quiet in the early days of the pandemic, Staci Hoff figured at least it would mean fewer deaths on the roads in 2020. She was wrong. Then, as cars began returning in 2021, she hoped maybe the carnage would slow as congestion increased and speeds decreased. She was wrong again. Washington ended…

The Duwamish tribe isn’t recognized by the US government. It doesn’t have its own reservation. More than a century of broken treaty promises, discriminatory laws and violence forced many of its people from their ancestral homelands in what is now the Seattle area. Still, the Duwamish continue to exist and fight for their survival. Today,…

People walking alone walk relatively quickly. A crowd walks slowly. But how does a crowd move when there is, say, a massive bull charging at them? To answer this, scientists analyzed the movement of a crowd of runners during the running of the bulls in Pamplona, Spain, in 2019. The San Fermín festival in Pamplona,…

More companies and families are looking to solar power for electricity. But, like with many industries, supply chain issues are prominent. The U.S. Solar Market Insight report released this month by the Solar Energy Industries Association and Wood MacKenzie claims policy uncertainty and supply chain issues are driving solar price increases. This resulted in a…

Wildfire smoke and urban air pollution bring out the worst in each other. As wildfires rage, they transform their burned fuel into a complex chemical cocktail of smoke. Many of these airborne compounds, including ozone, cause air quality to plummet as wind carries the smoldering haze over cities. But exactly how — and to what…