Many factors go into choosing where you want to live. Besides things like education and employment, lack of pollution is at the top of most people’s lists.
According to local air experts, Bakersfield is in an unlucky location, surrounded by mountains that trap toxic farming chemicals, dust, truck, and train fumes, oil-drilling exhaust, and pollution blowing south from other parts of the populous state.
Along with areas on the west side of metropolitan Chicago, the neighborhoods that make up the South Side have had to live alongside some of the region’s dirtiest industries.
While job cuts in recent decades have left some parts abandoned and blighted, many factories still operate. Air pollution experts have faulted the state of Indiana for its lack of controls on emissions.
The region has also been dealing with the side effects of heavy traffic for years. High levels of air pollution are blanketing much of Indianapolis’s central core.