Saw a photo of my hometown from 1992 and it hit me hard

I was scrolling old family photos last night and came across a picture of Main Street from 1992. The air in that photo looks clear, you can see the mountains behind downtown clear as day. Nowadays you're lucky to see them 30 days a year through the haze. We used to have about 80,000 people in the valley back then, now it's pushing 300,000. All those extra cars and construction dust just sit in the bowl we live in. My brother lives over in Colorado and says the same thing happened to Denver in about the same time frame. Anyone else see a big shift in your local air quality over the last 30 years?

2 comments

2 Comments

the_abby14d ago

Yeah the air here used to be a lot cleaner too. That haze creeps up on you slowly.

henry_hernandez14d agoMost Upvoted

Wait, isn't that more of a dust or smoke situation than a haze? Haze is usually from humidity or temperature inversions, right? I'm not an expert or anything, but I remember reading that the haze we get in the summer is just moisture, not pollution. The air quality report here usually blames the haze on the heat and the lake, not on cars or factories. Though I could be wrong, I'm just a guy with three kids and a phone.