Exercise and Pollution

March 8, 2005 2:25 AM

If I exercise in a polluted environment, is the net result positive or negative?

I work in an industrial area and bike between the train station and work, about 20 minutes each way. My entire commute is through a polluted area filled with factories and a dump blowing out smoke, and there are quite a few cars on the road with me. It feels good to get the exercise, and I'm hoping to drop a few pounds now that I'm doing this, but am I harming my lungs and health? My other option is just to take the bus.

posted by hazyjane to Sports, Hobbies, & Recreation (16 answers total)

I am not at all qualified to answer this, but my opinion is that burning the calories is more important than breathing in some bad air.
posted by furiousxgeorge at 2:48 AM on March 8, 2005

Here is an article on exercise and pollution by the American Lung Association.

I can't really say whether the net result is positive or negative, but I have read somewhere that rush hour roadside pollution can be as bad as smoking a pack of cigarettes. I jog every day in a fairly urban area and I've noticed that if I don't get out before the traffic does, I feel it. I also try to use side streets or streets with little stop and go traffic - they seem a bit easier on the lungs.
posted by a22lamia at 3:11 AM on March 8, 2005

This comes up pretty regularly on the various bicycle forums. The consensus is kind of mixed. If you can do as a22lamia says and beat the rush, that will probably help. One of my coworkers once asked me if I was worried about bike commuting in traffic, since I was 'breathing in exhaust fumes.' I asked him what magic filter his car was equipped with that protected him. Burning some calories is more important, IMHO.
posted by fixedgear at 3:53 AM on March 8, 2005

I have read somewhere that rush hour roadside pollution can be as bad as smoking a pack of cigarettes.

I'd like to see the facts one way or the other on that one. I have sometimes wondered whether people who are hyper-aware of one form of pollution (secondhand tobacco smoke, which makes so many people so angry) are ignoring and creating something comparable (secondhand automotive smoke).
posted by pracowity at 4:28 AM on March 8, 2005

being a bit pedantic here, but a22lamia compared the pollution to smoking a pack of cigarettes (ie directly), not second hand smoke. personally i would have thought the density of smoke was much stronger from a cigarette - you hear of people throwing up on their first smoke, yet the same people seem to be able to step outside on a busy monday morning without too many problems. so i suspect the comparison with second hand smoking is more accurate.
posted by andrew cooke at 4:37 AM on March 8, 2005

Here is a study on exercise and outdoor air pollution that is pretty interesting.

Although I honestly can't remember where I read the rush hour roadside pollution ... here is an article about roadside pollution in the UK equating roadsides in Oxford to 30 cigarettes in a day.

Andrew, I'm pretty sure it is compared to actually smoking a cigarette. The average bout of exercise lasts much longer than a cigarette, and if you are doing it right, you are breathing much more deeply. I never would have believed there was as much of an impact if I didn't feel it for myself first hand. I use to live in a really rural area and never felt sick after running. After moving to the city I would come home from late morning runs feeling like I use to when I'd spent too much time at a bar smoking - all nauseous and such.
posted by a22lamia at 4:52 AM on March 8, 2005

i know what you mean - i run in santiago, which has smog problems (with and without - self links). BUT the study you quote is (1) for nitrous oxides only (most damage from cigarettes is from a whole pile of other things) and (2) the 30 cigs figure is for a whole day. so running for 30-60mins is nowhere near as bad as you seem to be implying.
posted by andrew cooke at 5:02 AM on March 8, 2005

Hey Andrew, those studies were just other on topic links. I'll retract my pack of cigs comment on the basis that I have no refs to back it up, but I do pretty clearly remember coming across the stat in the last year or so.

Can't wait till the snow is cleared off the local bike path and I can jog and sleep past 6 o'clock.
posted by a22lamia at 5:15 AM on March 8, 2005

sorry, i did say i was being pedantic. arguing the other way for a moment, there are various (official) levels of smog here. at the worst, schools are closed. at a lower level, school sports are banned. so clearly someone thinks there's a point at which exercise is worse than nothing.
posted by andrew cooke at 5:18 AM on March 8, 2005

If you have the choice of exercising somewhere out of the city and taking a relatively clean (or brief, anyway) ride to work, assuming that means you are spending more time out of city traffic and less time breathing hard in traffic, that probably would be the choice to make. Air Pollution, Heart Disease and Stroke (American Heart Association):

Another study confirmed the importance of variations of pollution within a single city. Its findings suggested that a person’s exposure to toxic components of air pollution may vary as much within one city as across different cities. After studying 5,000 adults for eight years, the researchers also found that exposure to traffic-related air pollutants was more highly related to mortality than were city-wide background levels. For example, those who lived near a major road were more likely to die of a cardiovascular event.

Some research has estimated that people living in the most polluted U.S. cities could lose between 1.8 and 3.1 years because of exposure to chronic air pollution.

But if a bus ride takes about the same amount of time as a bike ride and the bus fills up with the same city pollutants every time it opens its doors, maybe you should just ride your bike, lose unhealthy extra weight, exercise your heart, and make your legs look fantastic.

Of course, you could also be hit by a bus.
posted by pracowity at 5:55 AM on March 8, 2005

Unless I'm mistaken, the poster was asking, in effect, whether exercizing with reduced oxygen in the air (due to pollution) would be like exercizing at high altitude (with reduced oxygen available), no?

I don't have an answer.
posted by ParisParamus at 6:21 AM on March 8, 2005

As a purely anecdotal contribution: I've noticed that certain weather conditions leave me at work breathless, and other times i can cycle up the hill with no difficulty whatsoever. It's light rain or low cloud which do it for me - although it doesn't stop me cycling in.

Also going in before or after rush "hour" (which in Leeds is a fairly short 8.15-9) helps. I'm always here late so i'm not sure what it's like leaving during rush hour. Is there a way you can avoid the traffic? like, get off a station earlier or later?
posted by handee at 6:25 AM on March 8, 2005

Breathing in through the nose helps -- this has come up on the bikeforums often. Our noses have a much thicker, stronger layer of mucuus that filters out more fine particulates than the mouth. That said, it still pretty much sucks, but life is too short to worry. I bike from brooklyn to manhattan, through traffic, a few times a week -- and I'll do it more in the summer.
posted by yonation at 7:52 AM on March 8, 2005

you might consider getting a mask - like a surgical mask that a doctor would wear - to wear on your commute ride. that's what people do in countries like china and taiwan where there are a lot of bikes, motorbikes, and cars all sharing the same space.
posted by scottreynen at 7:57 AM on March 8, 2005

I asked him what magic filter his car was equipped with that protected him.

It's called a "cabin air filter." It screens out the particulates, at least.
posted by kindall at 8:31 AM on March 8, 2005

It's called a "cabin air filter." It screens out the particulates, at least.

Yeah, my Outback has one and I just changed it. It was pretty dirty. It was my understanding that if the particle is big enough that you can see it, you don't need to worry too much about breathing it in. It will get filtered by the mucous membranes.
posted by fixedgear at 12:57 PM on March 8, 2005