Khan air quality fund for schools

London mayor Sadiq Khan has announced a £1.05m fund to help schools tackle air pollution. Air quality audits have been completed by consultant WSP for 50 schools across 23 boroughs. Each will now receive £10,000 to deliver non-transport interventions. The remaining funding will be available to any school in areas exceeding legal air pollution limits, with £300,000 for green infrastructure and £250,000 for 20 schools to trial filtration systems for indoor air pollution (much of which originates outdoors). The mayor is also encouraging boroughs to use some of their £237m allocation from TfL this year to deliver audit recommendations. To promote the funding, Khan visited St Mary’s primary school in Westminster, which has worked with the city council to develop a one-year road closure trial outside the school entrance at the start and end of the school day. This will commence this summer. The staff car park is to be turned into a garden and a ‘green wall’ of vegetation will be planted on the playground wall. The Greater London Authority has also developed a toolkit to help boroughs conduct audits at other schools.