Yeah, agreed there. We (Tainan) have Kaohsiung and KHH county to thank for that. If the wind is just right (wrong?) then it blasts all the factory smog up our way and away from KHH, which is what happens most of the time. Typhoon season is usually the best time as the typhoons clear up the air nicely. That said, we’ve had loads of nice blue sky weather this year. And it seems to be improving, because eight to ten years ago you hardly ever saw a blue sky day, now it’s much more common.
As for Taipei, I’m usually unlucky, because I seem to bring the clouds and the rain with me…
Dude, you can’t see your hand in front of your face in Hong Kong! Not that I could see my hand in front of my face atop Everest, considering the 3-4 packs I smoke a day. :beatnik:
Hong Kong’s REALLY smoggy. So is Bangkok, but I never really noticed, due to other distractions.
Ok, maybe HK has got worse over the last few years. . Taipei’s particulate pollution is bad from the scooters and trucks and dense housing. I wouldn’t have thought Seoul was that bad from my visits there. Let’s face it most of North Asia is polluted to hell.
I gotta say, its not that bad here. Rush hour can leave your hair smelling like scooter exhaust…but its pretty breathable, in fact after rains the air can be pretty nice!
I was expecting awful gross air…I have been pleasantly surprised.
i didnt think taipei’s air was noticeably bad. comparable to any big dense city around the world. i think LA’s air is pretty bad. on a bad day the sun doesnt come out until 10am cuz it’s blocked by the smog or haze which gets pretty white where you cant even see the mountains surrounding the city at all.
Nah…the air is really terrible compared to most European cities…especially summer time or when the brown cloud arrives from China. There’s a lot of black dust (diesel exhaust/rubber/coal) , you’ll see it settle in your apartment. Don’t use LA as a reference 
. Of course China is worse too but that’s not saying much.
[quote=“Deuce Dropper”][quote=“Epiphanie”]a) Seoul
b) Hong Kong / Shenzhen / Guangzhou
c) Shanghai
d) Bangkok
e) Ho Chi Minh City
Can you do it? Thanks for any thoughts!
I have been to the five listed cities, but not Taipei, so I’m curious as to what I can expect, and since I can’t pull up / make sense of the statistics I thought comparison was the best way to get an idea. 
[/quote]
I’ve been to all the above.
Taipei is better than all of them.
Seoul (most similar)
HK/Guangzhou/Shenzhen (drop HK and this group falls to the bottom like a rock)
HCMC (can be the worst in the wrong spots)
Shanghai (gross most of the time)
Bangkok (central areas are putrid)[/quote]
Ditto. HCMC is neck and neck with parts of Manila City for sheer shock value and (un)palatability. Bangkok is permeating. HK…? Like breathing sandpaper. Seoul, pleasant when stacked up against the others.
Heh, I lived in Pasadena for a while, which is really close to some of LA’s mountains (as in ~5 km to 1700 m peaks). A few weeks after I moved there, I looked up one day, and - holy shit, where the hell did those mountains come from? It’s amazing what you can hide behind a little smog.
Plenty of blue skies in Taipei. Except for the Chinese dust storms, I haven’t noticed anything about Taipei’s air (probably helps that I’m almost never out and about in rush hour) - I was actually pleasantly surprised by how clear it gets.
Is it just me or is Taipei especially hazy today?
Could be worse. Google images of Indonesia’s man made disaster. Between that and China’s contribution: stay indoors!
Really muggy today.
It’s not you. The air quality index today is around 139 according to Google. “Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups”.
Just had our first day of clean air in over a month here in KL. The little guy is old enough now (3 months) to appreciate the greenery as we walked round the garden and oh lord was the sun nice on my face. It’s been so hazy it was literally obvious this morning it had lifted as the light coming through the windows was about 10x brighter.
Went to Maokong yesterday, and from the gondola saw Taipei was wreathed in haze. Very worrying. But another passenger was telling us he’d just come from Singapore, and there the air quality index was 250 and due to rise to 300, much higher than here. I can’t imagine what it must be like trying to live and work in that muck.
Let’s blame it to Indonesia.
Air pollution is a big problem in Taiwan every year
But many don’t seem to notice it if they don’t live in the central and southern region.
Anyway I heard Taipei was bad my wife was complaining the floor was
Sticky from the oily particles adhering. Guess it mostly blew over from China where it was particularly bad this week.
The Air Pollution is Singapore is no joke, got to wear n95 for several weeks and it sucks.
Is it really so bad in Singapore?
63 doesn’t seem so bad. Does that require a mask?
It’s 877 in New Delhi.
Loving the weather but hating the air pollution .
Question for people who’ve been around 10+ years or 5+ years.
Do you guys remember the air pollution being this bad years ago in Taipei?
I don’t remember so many hazy days. I had a gap where I didn’t live in Taipei for a few years and to me it seems worse since I moved back.
I’m wondering has it been getting worse or am I paying more attention to the issue these days?
Anybody got any figures?
The government pulished some numbers recently said PM2.5 levels across the whole island have got slightly worse over the last 3 years, but I’d like to see some numbers for Taipei specifically.