Downtown Air Quality

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Downtown Air Quality

Client: Winooski Community Development Corporation

Challenge
The Winooski Community Development Corporation (WCDC) is a consortium of businesses, organizations, and professional groups devoted to revitalizing dowtown Winooski, Vermont, through smart growth development. The redevelopment plan includes a total of 3,100 parking spaces to serve a mix of land uses.

Initiative
The WCDC retained RSG to perform traffic and air quality studies in order to develop the indirect source air pollution permit application for the project.

  • Estimated congestion levels at intersections affected by 15% or more of project-generated traffic
  • Estimated concentrations of carbon monoxide (CO) at intersections where the estimated congestion level was Level of Service “D” or worse, using the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) CAL3QHC air dispersion model
  • Developed vehicle emission factors for the air dispersion model using the EPA MOBILE model
  • Prepared an indirect source air pollution permit application for submission to the Vermont Air Pollution Control Division (APCD)

Results
Our model-predicted results indicated that CO levels would not exceed National Ambient Air Quality Standards for any scenario. The WCDC received an indirect source air pollution permit from the APCD for the project.