DEQ Teams with Mayors on
‘Idle-Free’ Campaign

 

From left: Salt Lake County Mayor Peter Corroon, Hawthorne Elementary School Principal Marian Broadhead, and Division of Air Monitoring Center's Bob Dalley
From left: Salt Lake County Mayor Peter Corroon, Hawthorne Elementary School
Principal Marian Broadhead, and Division of Air Monitoring Center's Bob Dalley

Schoolchildren are telling their parents to turn it off when it comes to leaving their vehicles running while waiting to pick them up from school.

It’s all part of an anti-idling campaign, “Turn Your Key, be Idle Free,” that Salt Lake City Mayor Ralph Becker and Salt Lake County Mayor Peter Corroon jump started this fall.

“Most people don’t think anything about idling while they’re talking to someone, dropping someone off or picking somebody up,” Becker said at the press conference. “They don’t even think about the fact that they’re wasting gas and contributing to air pollution.”

The Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) joined Salt Lake City, Salt Lake County and Moms for Clean Air to encourage people to change that habit of leaving their vehicles running for an extended length of time.

DEQ created a Web site, http://www.idlefree.utah.gov, to provide facts about the problem of idling vehicles.

Take this, for instance: A single vehicle dropping off and picking up kids at one school puts three pounds of pollution into the air per month. Vehicle exhaust is hazardous to human health, with children being most vulnerable because of their developing lungs. Asthma symptoms increase as a result of car exhaust.

“What we’re really trying to do is change behavior,” said Stacee Adams, environmental consultant with DEQ’s Office of Planning and Public Affairs. “People have a lot of assumptions about turning their car off. Our website is geared to give people the facts about idling and encourage them to do what works for their lifestyle. Not idling isn’t going to solve all of our air quality problems, but it is a step in the right direction. It also has a significant impact on the quality of air you breathe in the cabin of your vehicle.”