Leeds goes Green to tackle air pollution for Clean Air Day

As Leeds battles some of the worst levels of air pollution in the country - today the city is going green to show us all what we can do to help.

It's for national Clean Air Day - around 3 thousand people are thought to die prematurely in Yorkshire alone every year because of pollution.

Rachel Hartshorne from Healthy Air Leeds says today's just half the battle...

"We don't have great enough public transport in the city so people drive, because it's more convenient and often it's cheaper to drive as well,

"The buses are expensive and don't run regularly - and it's a big city, so it's not necessarily that people can walk everywhere."

We're all being urged to ditch our cars for the day and find other ways of getting to and from work and school.

We're challenged our reporter Tom Dambach to change his morning commute...

Jill Wood is the headteacher at Little London Primary school in Leeds, who are getting involved with Clean Air Day - she tells us why:

"It was our school council, who'd been talking to our Deputy head about keeping the air clean,

"And they thought there was a lot of pollution, our school is surrounded by a lot of very busy main roads,

"They were the people who started this push really, to how could we change our area."

We'll be bringing you updates on Tom's run to Radio Aire and the other events going on in the city to help tackle pollution.

And success!