When the opportunity arose to apply for an EPA Environmental Justice Problem Solving grant, Sixth Street Community Center saw a chance to tackle one of the neighborhood’s most pressing issues—air quality—in an area pocked with pollution sources, like the fossil fuel powered East River Power Station and the FDR Drive.
In the heart of Manhattan’s Lower East Side, Sixth Street Community Center has long been a hub for grassroots environmental action. Through a range of programs and organizing campaigns, the Center has become a cornerstone of the neighborhood’s ongoing fight for environmental justice. When the opportunity arose to apply for an EPA Environmental Justice Problem Solving grant, Sixth Street Community Center saw a chance to tackle one of the neighborhood’s most pressing issues—air quality—in an area pocked with pollution sources, like the fossil fuel powered East River Power Station and the FDR Drive. To support this work, Sixth Street also received a pilot award from the Center on Health and Environment Across the LIfeSpan (HEALS), an NIEHS-funded Center located at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. The project’s goal was simple but powerful: help residents understand, measure, and take action on their local air quality.
The team wanted an air quality monitoring device that was accessible, affordable, and easy to use to help demystify air quality science for residents. After reviewing options, they selected the AirBeam because its user-friendly mobile app and data dashboard made it ideal for both stationary and mobile monitoring, and its responsive customer support added extra assurance for a community-based project.
Recognizing that community engagement starts with knowledge, the Sixth Street team developed a curriculum around the AirBeam for local high school students and youth groups to learn how to operate the AirBeam and interpret air quality data, conduct air quality tests and identify pollution sources, and participate in community air walks to track air quality in real time. Summer “monitoring walks” became a highlight. Students would stroll through the neighborhood, passing idling trucks or congested intersections and watch the PM2.5 readings spike instantly on their phones—a powerful moment that made invisible pollutants visible. As one student put it, “It’s one thing to know the air isn’t great. It’s another to see the numbers jump when you walk past a bus stop.”
From the beginning, the project was deeply participatory. Sixth Street hosted public meetings and invited local residents and afterschool students who were already passionate about climate and health issues, as well as residents who were interested in learning more. Participants decided which areas to monitor based on their lived experiences—places where kids played, where older residents lived, or where they noticed heavy traffic. The team adapted activities for people with different schedules, ensuring anyone who wanted to participate could. This flexibility fostered a sense of ownership and collective purpose.
Residents were already aware their neighborhood ranked in the 98th percentile nationwide for asthma rates, but seeing the air quality data firsthand made that reality hit closer to home. The project’s findings gave context to what many already knew from experience, turning statistics into something tangible and visible. This connection between air pollution and public health strengthened residents’ commitment to environmental justice and empowered them to advocate more effectively for cleaner air and healthier living conditions.
A supplementary grant allowed the project to continue beyond its initial phase. With that support, the team created a user guide on how to use AirBeams for both stationary and mobile monitoring, and began developing a toolkit for other communities and academic partners. This toolkit outlines practical steps for replicating the project—covering community engagement strategies, curriculum templates, data interpretation, and tips for adapting the program globally.
Ultimately, the project became a model for community science, demonstrating how accessible technology and participatory methods can turn curiosity into data and data into action. As one Sixth Street Community Center member reflected, “The AirBeam made it possible for residents to see what was in their air—and once they saw it, they couldn’t ignore it. It turned invisible problems into visible change.”