Establishing an Air Quality Index Based on Proxy Data for Urban Planning Part 1: Methodological Developments and Preliminary Tests

In the last few decades, urban planning has expanded regarding environmental considerations. However, air quality, which is regarded as an important aspect of the green development of cities, is not considered in urban planning. This research aims to propose a tool to easily introduce air quality considerations into urban projects. Nowadays, the usual air pollutants (NOx, PM, SO2, and O3) are measured via sophisticated monitoring stations—or even low-cost devices—to give near-real-time air quality indices. However, stations are not adapted to local air pollution and real-time data are not helpful for planning purposes. An index able to rank areas and projects based on urban “air proxy data” would help decision makers. This paper presents how to create an air quality index as a decision support tool for urban planning. No pollutant measurement campaign will be necessary and only data that are easily accessible, even to nonexperts, are used. This paper describes the methodological development of an index that we call AQOI (Air Quality Observed Index), and the results obtained for four different locations (industrial, urban, and rural) considered as preliminary tests.