EURO-ECO 2009 Hanover 3 - 4 Dezember 2009	Environmental, Engineering - Economic and Legal Aspects for Sustainable Living
	European Academy of Natural Sciences, Hanover European Scientific Society, Hanover University of Bremen, Bremen

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Traffic jam became wide-spread phenomena in large Russian cities. Internal combustion emissions include more than 200 pollutants. Traffic health and mortality risk is still a subject of investigations. Investigations of health risk caused by traffic are seldom and uncommon in the Russian Federation. Specific investigations on health risk generated by traffic jam never were held in the RF cities before.

The National Australian Health and Medical Research Council report says that traffic jams in the East Motorway M5 in Sidney raise health risks such as aggravating asthma, respiratory infection and a rise in the lifetime risk of cancer. Due to traffic jam concentration of pollutants was 100 fold higher than in average. The report makes evident an importance of traffic jam assessment as a trigger to health risk elsewhere.

The investigation indicated that usually traffic jam has low uneven car speed and high intensity of the stream because of its high density. Margin between cars is dangerously small. Collision risk and health risk are “walking” together producing synergetic effect. Usually level crossing is a place for both collisions and low uneven speed, which produces significant health risk.

The investigation includes stream intensity measurements for the most loaded level crossings and cloverleaves of roads in the central part of Nizhny Novgorod. Russian and EPA US emission models were used for comparative calculations.

Dispersion of pollutants was calculated for adjacent to roads areas. Different dispersion models were compared including world famous CALINES and Zone developed by JSC Lenecosoft (Russia).

Layers of concentration were calculated for both carcinogenic and non carcinogenic pollutants including PM, 1,3-butadiene (BD), Benzol, acrolein, formaldehyde, acetaldehyde, sulfur dioxide and nitrogen dioxide.

Calculations have made evident underestimations of traffic health risk during traffic jam. Traffic jam was characterized by approximately eightfold raise of health risk.

Conclusions of the investigation are as follows.

• Trafic jam causes significant growth of pollutant concentration.
• Special attention should be paid to carcinogenic risk produced by PM, 1,3 butadiene, benzol and formaldehyde, which are range fold more dangerous pollutants than well known carcinogenic benzpyrene.