Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Why can't we open a window on the hottest day of the year Haringey Council? Air pollution w/c 18 May
Tags for Forum Posts: air pollution, ladder air pollution
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Tim Gent
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The levels of pollution are nuts. Very much hoping our new councillors can step up and take this on
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Permalink Reply by D Jones
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maybe email your local new green councillor, and if they can be bothered, they might even reply (we live in hope)
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Yep will be doing that. Sounds like positive signs so far with them engaging, so fingers crossed it leads to real improvements
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Hi Alice,
First off, I want to frame my response as someone who entirely agrees that there is a pollution problem in the area. Your data is clearly showing the background level of PM2.5 particles to be averaging higher than health organisation recommend, and this needs to be dealt with. Furthermore, thank you for your consistency is recording this data, and various action you have taken, it really has help highlight the issue.
I would like to give three points of opinion.
The first, as a born and breed Londoner, I studied, read, watched the demise of areas such as Camden and Notting Hill, due to the result of patterns not too dissimilar to the objections you put forward.
The pattern follows that an area becomes a magnet due to it vibrate culture/nightlife/street markets, luring folk into the area to become part of the scene, and others due to the relatively cheap house prices. Years later the same residence have now matured, become concerned in return of their investment in their house, and likely have started a family, so rightfully their focus in life changed.
The once fun market now considered a rat problem. The favourite vibrate club has one too many drunken cheers late one night and wake the residents kids. The kebab shop, once the resident's staple go-to after a good night out, now just considered a populating stinky mess. With good intentions, the same residents who once enjoyed the area's vibe start to put pressure on the council to do something about the very same things that drew them to the area. These campaign become the demise of areas as the council's begin strict rules, curfews, and fines, among other actions. Gradually, businesses close up and move on, eventually, leaving quite a hollow shell behind. Green Lanes is vibrant, and unique, and I would hate to lose it to a heavy-handed council decision.
The second, is that as much as your data does clearly show spikes toward the evening, this does not mean it is grill smoke. Correlation and causation are often mixed up. I would have no doubt that the number of Turkish grills is in some way contributing to the area's pollution, but I just do not see your data pointing to it be the primary causation.In some of your previous sets of data, I have seen spikes in the early hours of the morning, this is clearly not grill smoke. Most of your data generally peaks just after evening rush hours, and we all know Green Lanes' traffic can be chaos at the time, and particles take time to build up. The folk who enjoy the high street's restaurants frequently drive into the area to do so, this can be seen in the fact parking is the worst between 7pm and 10pm as the diners' cars fill up the side streets.
Focusing on this latest data set, we see a massive spike at the weekend in the afternoon/evening. PM2.5 need a consistent wind speed of over 4.5mph to be moved it on. Overlapping wind speed and your data, it's seen that the wind drops and then the data spikes. So, we are seeing a build up of pollution over hours that is not being cleared away. That build up spiked at 8pm, not emissions spiked at that time. 8pm is quite early for a Mediterranean dining schedule.
If there were higher wind speeds and a spike in particulates, then we could say emissions at that moment were high. Even then, there is a chance local populates are being topped up by the wind carrying particles from the surrounding areas.I would say for more clarity in your data, atmospheric pressure, wind speed and direction need tracking. Then, when there is a spike, match it with the weather to build a picture. For example, if there is an uncharacteristic early morning spike, track the wind direction, this might form a picture of populates being brought into the area from a certain direction.
The third, which is linked to the second, is that by making your argument about the grills, it is only weakening it. I'm no statistician, but I see the grill argument as flawed, which means so will the council or any expert they bring in. To me, the primary cause is still from the rubber and brake wear that occurs in peak traffic, which then lingers in the area. Secondary causes might be things like factory emissions carried into the area causing the early morning spikes, and grill smoke contributing to the evening highs.
Again, I think there is clear evidence of a population problem, and that there needs to be action taken to resolve it. I think you are fighting a good fight trying to deal with it. However, maybe downgrade the grill smoke to a contributing factor, not the primary argument, and have the council do their job in finding and dealing with the cause.
Thank you for your hard work on this, and these are on my opinions.
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Permalink Reply by Justin Guest
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@mr cf.
You make some good points here, a couple of thoughts. I am a Pemberton resident. I should say I have been here 23 years, and the restaurant trade has grown tremendously over that time, it was originally a few single fronted places. Not what we see today, which is giving rise to a now constant, and increasingly difficult issue. I believe three more grills are soon to open on Green Lanes for example.
First- we are not suggesting for a second any of the restaurants need to close- I like kebabs as much as the next person. Our approach is more focused on appropriately characterising and quantifying the problem (as you rightly suggest is needed) and then find appropriate technical solutions. For example, if it is restaurant emissions let's look at technology like electrostatic precipitation technology, as is done effectively in industry and has been for 50 years. Part of the issue is that the current regulation around kitchen grills does not anticipate large clusters of very big (triple fronted) restaurants clustered in one small location. So, today they may be compliant, but collectively a problem is created.
Second- I and others have been trying to engage with the council to invest the intellectual bandwidth into assessing this problem to do exactly what you suggest in properly monitoring the problem, and take into account all variables, wind, time of day, location of monitors, road traffic etc. Our previous councilors Zena and Anna were working hard to get officers to take the issue seriously and empirically assess the situation so an evidence based approach could be taken. Over the past decade of trying we have zero result. Its only with the pressure Alice is putting on people as a result of monitors from (I believe from Breath London) having been installed at the bottom of Pemby that we even have the real data we have showing there is a real problem. We really hope our new Green Councilors can carry on this work and get something done!
Our Citizen Science approach is not enough, and frankly we do not have the means to drive change, only the council can do this.
As a final thought, you are right about causality- but when I smell chicken I think Kebabs. Anyone who has experience the kind of smog we are seeing will really quickly come to the same conclusions. You are welcome to message me, and when we have an episode I will give you a call and you can come check it out yourself, don't take my word for it.
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Hi Mr CF
Welcome to the pollution conversation :)1. We are very much not against the restaurants. We think the council should work with the restaurants to improve filtration and the air quality leaving the building. Hackney and Westminster councils have implemented measures and their nightlife, as far as I know, has not been affected. On the contrary, restaurants who were part of the vanguard scheme are proud to contribute to an improvement in local air quality. A state of the art filtration unit costs around £3500. That's not a lot for one of the thriving restaurant that we residents are happy to call our neighbours.
2. Let's talk about the data and why it's not cars. If it were cars there would be a connection between NO2 emissions - the lines would mirror each other. And they don't. You can review the data yourself via a public monitor here: https://www.breathelondon.org/sensors/sensor-profile?device=14672. Compare it to other areas if you like. There are other posts where I've done so. (https://harringayonline.com/forum/topics/4x-the-who-limit-the-3-500...)
The second way we can definitively tell it's not traffic is by the times. Traffic peaks at morning and evening rush hours not at 8PM. To be fair, you're right, there are on average smaller peaks at 5AM which could be due to clearing the grills, smouldering fuel or local air pressure. However, on average the peaks on weekends in the evening are significantly higher at dinner service time.
To be 100% sure of the methodology, I contacted the statisticians at Breathe London directly. They confirmed the data profiles indicate cooking fuel emissions rather than traffic, noting:
"- We are hoping to have a Breathe London event later in the year focussed on commercial cooking and how different groups can address this- when we have a date for this, we will let you know and you will be very welcome to attend.
- We may also have a possible project later in the year on more detailed measurement of pollution from commercial cooking. If this project proceeds, we will get in touch to see how we may be able to work with you and understand more about the pollution on Green Lanes.
- Finally, Breathe London communities recently had a learning session with Global Cooksafe Coalition (GCC) on commercial cooking. The GCC are doing some really interesting work, and it could be useful for you to get in contact and link up with them. "
The data is objective and clear. The council is now fully aware of the issue, and we hope to see them take positive, supportive steps for both residents and businesses soon.
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Partly inspired by the above discussion, I looked into two key questions: the effects of wind, and whether traffic could be responsible for observed spikes in PM2.5, rather than emissions from nearby restaurant grills.
Test the effect of wind
I managed to find hourly wind speed and direction data, which I used to examine how PM2.5 levels changed with wind conditions.
First, I calculated the average PM2.5 by wind direction for each hour of the day since September 2025. This analysis shows two clear patterns: PM2.5 tends to increase in the evening around 6–7 pm, and levels are higher when winds blow from east to west:
Given the comment about the effects of wind speed, I then tested this same analysis with a minimum wind speed threshold of 4.5 km/h (ie excluding any hours where the wind level was below that), and this gave basically the same result:
Therefore, it seems pretty clear that the pollution is coming from the East of the sensor, is much worse in the evenings around 6-7pm, and is not sensitive to wind speed so is presumably an ongoing source rather than pollution ‘sitting’ at the sensor.
Testing the effect of traffic
I couldn’t find the necessary data (ie traffic numbers by hour, for an extended period) in order to run equivalent analysis on traffic. However, official DfT counts from 2022 at the Green Lanes / Beresford Road junction near Beans and Barley show that vehicle numbers at 6–7 pm are only about 10 % higher than during the morning peak at 7–8 am (1,801 vs 986 vehicles). By contrast, average PM2.5 levels more than double during the same period:
Therefore, it seems very unlikely that the differences in PM2.5 levels could be explained by the traffic.
I’d note that Rae’s post above is probably a better test of the role of traffic anyway!
Conclusions
It looks to me like the combination of:
- Easterly source location compared to the sensor on Pemberton Road,
- The scale of evening peaks,
- Relatively small changes in traffic levels between morning and evening
- Ongoing nature of the pollution source
…are all consistent with the issue primarily arising from the restaurants’ use of grills.
All the data I’ve used is public and available in the links below, so I would welcome others to test this further themselves. However, from my perspective this is probably as much as an interested citizen can really do, and well above the threshold to justify the Council (who is best placed to do any further work) taking it seriously and starting to act.
Data sources
- Wind data: Open-Meteo Historical Weather API
- Traffic data: DfT Road Traffic Count Point 28532
- PM2.5 data: OpenAQ Monitor 6091550
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Nice work, D.
I wasn't aware of that OpenAQ monitor. It seems to be located in South Harringay school. The BreatheLondon one is on Green Lanes which may account for slight differences in data. So, that's two independent monitors giving similar results. And a good case for action over further analysis.
Maybe the recently appointed Cllr Dixie-Ann Joseph will take up our cause? Air quality is in the "Placemaking" remit...
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Permalink Reply by Geraldine
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It is exactly because it is the hottest day of the year that you shouldn't open the window. (Apologies if this has been posted before - I haven't time to read everything.) I live in a sub-tropical climate and most of us keep our windows closed on blazing hot no cloud days. All it does is let the heat and the pollution into your home.
"Sunshine acts as a powerful catalyst for air pollution. While sunlight itself isn't a pollutant, its UV rays trigger chemical reactions between tailpipe and industrial emissions to create dangerous ground level ozone and smog."
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Permalink Reply by Michael Anderson
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That exactly what I do Geraldine but late evenings when the temperature drops all my windows and doors are opened to let in some cooler air - right when the particulate levels are at their highest.
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Spot on Michael. We wait until the sun goes down before opening windows. I suspect there's not much breeze anyway during the day. The real culprit is the sun. Once the rain comes and washes pollution away, as it surely will, we can breathe again. If you've no air-conditioning, Dyson and other manufacturers sell a great bladeless heater/cooler fan which uses an evaporation process. It can cool a small room and really helps at night too.
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If the main contributor was traffic wouldn't the readings fall as the evening rush hour subsidies rather than increase? There have been several photographs published here on HOL showing visible clouds being emitted from restaurants (I recall several at the bottom of Pemberton Road). The evidence of pollution from grill restaurants has been convincing enough for some local authorities like to actually take action. With the concentration of grill restaurants on Green Lanes should not Haringey at least be carrying out their own monitoring?
https://harringayonline.com/forum/topics/worse-than-traffic-how-nei...
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