Local residents in Southall concern over air pollution claimed to be caused by a housing development.
Ealing Council has said it is aware of concerns of residents, while Imperial College is also conducting independent research.
Ealing Council has said it is aware of concerns of residents, while Imperial College is also conducting independent research.
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00:00 main concern is the pollution on the site. It's heavily
00:06 polluted because it used to be a former gasworks, so the burning of coal and oil
00:12 created lots of by-products that seeped into the soil. My experience back in 2017
00:19 and 2018 was a really intense pungent odour. I used to work at the local
00:25 college, West London College. The odour used to enter my office and also
00:30 classrooms and also at home. And certainly when I was at work I used to
00:34 fear for the young children. We have progressed to the point where Imperial
00:40 College are actually doing a biomonitoring project and that involved
00:44 local residents having a chemical sampler in their garden for three months
00:48 and then providing blood and urine samples. As part of the research the
00:53 college will conduct residential, ambient and personal exposure assessments of
00:58 populations at ex-brownfield sites, beginning with residential developments
01:03 built on ex-gasworks such as the development in South Hall. The college
01:08 says it will explore the feasibility of examining internal biomarkers of
01:12 exposure and response in vulnerable populations living at these locations
01:17 and that it should have conclusive results around the new year. We have
01:22 reached out to property developers Berkeley Group who have not yet
01:25 responded. They declined to comment to The Guardian in April 2023. Well it all
01:30 started in late 2015. Came back home from work one day, the front garden was full
01:38 of red dust, the rear garden the same. Nobody telling us what's going on and
01:45 later on in 2016 our plants, my plants in the rear garden started dying. Ill health
01:53 yes, sore throats, headaches. When you're at home you feel lazy, that's even
02:00 happening today. Well my back garden touches to the boundary of the old
02:06 gasworks. We call it the wall. The wall goes all along Beaconsfield Road at the
02:11 rear of our gardens and I think I've got a 12 balconies looking upon me now onto
02:17 my rear garden. There's no sympathy basically from the local politicians.
02:24 There is no sympathy whatsoever. Now Ealing Council say that in 2009 it
02:32 initially refused planning permission for the development but the London Mayor
02:36 at the time Boris Johnson overruled it and the project went ahead. The council
02:41 claims it is aware of the health concerns that local residents have and
02:44 have encouraged Public Health England to monitor the area. It continues that any
02:50 decision made by the council is based on evidence and it welcomes any further
02:54 development in research conducted by Imperial College.