titre: PHYTO-
SENSOR WORKSHOP + WALK
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id: workshopwalk
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## Phyto-sensor workshop and walk
During the Phyto-sensor workshop and walk we investigated air quality plants and gardens in the locations
indicated on the map included with this toolkit. Participants also provided a number of helpful contributions for testing and further developing the toolkit in its final form.
Many of the participants’ observations and contributions are included here, along with photo documentation of the event. There are many helpful, detailed, and creative suggestions for air quality gardens and toolkits. Although we have not had space to include all the suggestions in our expanded toolkit, we have incorporated some of these suggestions here. You might find these suggestions helpful when thinking about how to develop air quality gardens in your communities.
If you would like to contribute further ideas for the Phyto-sensor toolkit, you can send these to Citizen Sense at: phytosensor@citizensense.net.
## Propositions for air quality gardens
### Planning and Organization
- Ensure that all Councils have a designated air quality officer who can focus on strategies for air quality planting.
- Share best practices and examples of other air quality planting schemes across Europe. Share details of other planting and maintenance systems in place at hot spots such as motorways next to residential areas.
### Community involvement
- Tap into gardening communities, and connect with popular gardening programmes on radio and TV to raise the profile of these issues, for example, with Gardener’s Question Time on BBC Radio 4.
- Involve communities in monitoring air pollution so they can become more aware of pollution levels and also identify where to locate air quality plantings.
- Set up community groups similar to neighbourhood watch schemes for planting and maintaining new street planting.
- Host community days for local planting and seed swaps of air quality plants.
### Planting
- Plant green walls near busy roads, especially where schools and residential blocks are near major traffic intersections.
- Make use of pollution-trapping shrubs and hedges near emissions sources.
- Provide roof gardens and vertical plantings of suitable air quality plants.
- At traffic intersections, locate tall pyramidal planters (with automatic irrigation) planted up with air quality plants that take up particulates and polluting gases. Include signage to explain the purpose of the plantings.
- Plant vegetation that is attractive, so that people who were not aware of the environmental issues could begin by appreciating the aesthetic value of plants, and then learn more about the wider benefits.
- Attend to local water requirements and dynamics by incorporating rainwater-harvesting plants and/or drought-tolerant plants, which also take up pollutants.
### Education
- Provide information on how to identify air pollution hot spots, including likely sources such as transport sources (tunnels are worse as there is no air movement upwards), at junctions where idling occurs, near busy roads (where green screens could be effective), and by heating outlets where NOx is emitted.
- Provide information on how to identify ecological symptoms, e.g., the presence of certain lichens can indicate clean air. Provide an indicator sheet on how pollution effects plants or how plants take up pollution, e.g., yellow leaves can mean more ozone with some plants, particulates adhere to fine hairs on leaves and stems.
- Provide how-to sheets for undertaking NO2 monitoring with diffusion tubes, so hot spots can be identified.
- Provide a list of trees and shrubs that are most effective for improving air quality, e.g., Birch, Yew.
- Provide more resources for people to choose air quality plants that are likely to succeed in the urban environment, including water, light and soil requirements.
- Provide case studies and layouts of air quality gardens that can give a general idea of the process involved and where to start.
### Maintenance
- Ensure that plants are hardy and able to cope with salinity.
- Plant vegetation that is low-maintenance and drought tolerant.
- Educate councils and people about how to spread salt and grit in the winter to avoid damage to trees and plants.
- Ensure that councils have contracts and policies for tree and plant maintenance that ensure salt, weedkiller and other damaging substances are not sprayed on trees.
- Save seeds from air quality plants to plant in other locations or exchange in seed swaps.
- Wait until flowering and seed setting have taken place before pruning and mowing.
- Compost material from air quality gardens.
