...1 Persuasive essay Comm/215 Prof. Manuel Hernández January 8, 2013 2 Bicycle or car? In 1870 the first all metal bicycle machine appeared. The pedals were attached directly to the front wheel with no freewheeling mechanism. Solid rubber tires and the long spokes of the large front wheel provided a much smoother ride than its predecessor. The front wheels became larger and larger as makers realized that the larger the wheel, the farther you could travel with one rotation of the pedals. You would purchase a wheel as large as your leg length would allow. This machine was the first one to be called a bicycle ("two wheels"). These bicycles enjoyed a great popularity among young men of means (they cost an average worker six month's pay), with the hey-day being the decade of the 1880s. A bicycle is a mechanism that has transported man for many decades. Now and days, bicycling is a great way to keep in shape and specially to move from one place to another in short distances. I believe you should use a bicycle for short distances to protect the environment as well as your health those not matter the type of bike you have. The purpose of this essay is to explain why people should ride a bicycle for short distance trips. By riding a bicycle, people can decrease gasoline consumption, improve the quality of their lives, and protect the environment. The first reason to use a bicycle for short distances is that you can cause a decrease of pollution for a healthier environment...
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...Skip to NavigationSkip to Content TermPaperWarehouse.com - Free Term Papers, Essays and Research Documents The Research Paper Factory JoinSearchBrowseSaved Papers Search Bicycles Are Better Than Cars In: Bicycles Are Better Than Cars I talk about bikes a lot. I think some people around me are kind of tired of hearing me talk about how great bikes are all the time. I believe bicycles are better than cars. I know some bike advocates still drive cars and get a little touchy about that. I used to drive a car. Growing up in Estacada, it seemed like there was an unwritten law that said "you must drive a car." I obeyed without question. I never even thought about it. One day when I was driving to work, I started noticing the cyclists around me and realizing that I was polluting the atmosphere and wasting resources and they weren't. I realized that I was contributing to the rising rate of asthma and that they weren't. They were part of the solution. I was part of the problem. I knew that the only solution was to buy a bicycle and start commuting by bike. Motor vehicle use degrades the environment in a number of ways, but bicycle use does not. Noise pollution, for instance, is a real problem for those living near highways, but bicycles produce no noise. Congestion creates stress for motor vehicle users, pedestrians, and cyclists, but bicycling does not significantly add to congestion. Adding extra lanes to existing roadways and building limited-access highways can degrade...
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...to own a car. Every day people drive a car to get to work, visit friends, buy groceries and complete many other chores. We are, like it or not, dependent on automobiles. However, bicycles are often a useful alternative and are more environmentally friendly. A car is but also costly and often difficult to pay for. To begin with, buying a two-year old car is smarter than purchasing a new one. After a new car depreciates a couple years, it can be purchased for thousands of dollars less. But whether buying new or used, the car’s cost is only part of the expense. Paying for insurance, maintenance, gas, and repairs adds significantly to the expense. Being able to repair a car yourself helps keep costs down, but there still is an expense. Costs of purchase, maintenance and repair aside, automobiles have an adverse effect on the environment that bicycles do not. Even before a car is driven it consumes energy. Automotive production leaves a giant footprint because materials such as steel, rubber, paints, plastics, and glass must be created before a new ride is ready to roll. But that’s not all; air quality suffers because vehicles are America’s biggest air quality compromisers, producing about one-third of all U.S air pollution. The also contribute to global warming. These findings have caused engineers to develop more eco-friendly cars for the future. Future cars may be powered by the sun or other natural sources. While a car might be necessary in some instances, a bicycle is an underrated...
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...even to run everyday errands. Lafayette has a big problem with biking accidents due to a lack of bike lanes around town. Being a college town we are very far behind on being bicycle friendly. We need to add more bicycle lanes around town, add barriers between the cars and bicycles, and spread bicycle awareness. Biking around Lafayette can unfortunately be very dangerous. As of right now there are only two main roads in Lafayette that have a bike lane. Saint Marry Street and Johnston Street and on those two roads the bike lane does not even span the whole road and instead just little parts of the road. When there are not bike lanes on roads, bikers are forced to ride in the motor vehicle lane obeying the same laws as a large car or truck. This can cause many problems to both cars and bicycle riders. Even the fanciest race bicycles cannot keep up with the 45-mile per hour speed limit on most Lafayette roads. When there are no bike lanes, bikes are expected to ride in the regular lane and obey regular traffic laws. This causes a problem due to the amount of vehicles that pile up behind the slow moving bicycle. Once the motor vehicle traffic starts to build up the drivers get very angry and start to drive aggressively. Aggressive driving does not only put other cars in danger, but it especially puts bicycle riders in danger since they are so unprotected from collisions. Besides the fact of the lack of bike lanes, Lafayette’s bike lanes are too small and close to regular traffic...
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...membership and pay each month, just buy a bike and hit the road. A healthy and active life means more years of living and be able to enjoy your children and grandchildren. Most people would want to add more years to their lives so riding will help. Cycling will actually make people live longer than people that do not do any physical activity. Studies show that, “Overall the health impact is so great that cyclist live up to 14 months longer than non-cyclist, research suggest,” (Dimbylow). Maintaining healthy when you are young will help you in your late years. Diseases are also one of the most leading causes of death next to the lack of exercising. Cycling trails in busy cities can prevent people from being idle and not doing any exercise, which can cause many kinds of diseases. In order to keep bodies healthy and disease free, people need to exercise. Dr. Ogilvie suggests, “Physical activity as a whole reduces the risk of many chronic conditions, such as diabetes and certain cancers” (Dimbylow). Diabetes is the leading cause of death for many people. Bicycling will also prevent people from getting cancer. Not only health is important for the bicyclists but also road safety needs to be better. Cities need to build independent lanes for bicyclists in busy cities, especially at intersections. Road safety for bicyclists is as important as their own...
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...some urban areas, can be faster than other transport modes (e.g. it often allows cyclists to avoid traffic jams and other obstructions). St. Kilda Bikes is a small to medium sized enterprise (SME) situated in the CBD of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. The firms specialises in distributing the worldrenowned Spanish brand “Orbea” bikes and their own design bike models, which are manufactured in China under the firm’s brand-name and sold in the Asia Pacific region. During 2008-11, the firm doubled its sales, even though the global financial crisis had dramatically eroded consumer purchasing power. Vincent Hong, the 25 year old owner of the business, learned from reading a popular magazine (Business Review Weekly) that much of the firm’s recent success may be attributable to cycling becoming a trendy and popular sport in Australia. Browsing the Internet, he decided to briefly cross-check the article with the Retail Cycle Traders Australia Website (RCTA, 2008), from which he found that the trend has continued for at least a decade and that: “Bicycle sales in Australia averaged 795,000 per year for the four years 1998-2001. In the four years since then, bike sales averaged 1,133,000 per year. By comparison, car sales have never reached one million in a year”. This information raised 1 Vincent’s interest in researching the trend further. Perhaps, the car dealer next to his store may cast more light on the trend, he thought. Discussions with the car dealer confirmed the website...
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...the community and police officers. The article Policing on Bicycles and Horses by Sam Swindell focuses on two types of community-oriented policing. The two types being bicycle and mounted patrol of C.O.P. Bicycle patrol is a type of community policing patrol serves well in that the police have the opportunity to encounter more citizens and extend their contacts in the community. Many police departments have been adapting bicycle patrols into their community policing programs due to the positive response given by the community and the officers. Mounted patrol has been around for centuries and will continue to be around as there is always a positive response from the community. Police on bicycles seem more approachable and attractive to citizens especially the youth. The officers tend to dress informal so they can be better recieved by the community. These officers have the same advatages as those on foot patrol have, but they are able to get move faster. They can hear, see and smell the community around them. The bicycles can go where cars can not. In the Los Angeles Police Department they enhanced mobility crowd control when bicycle patrol was first deployed in 2000. The article also states that bicycle patrol is quieter than any car. The article tells about the disadvatages of bicycle patrol. It states that eleven percent have been stuck by a car while riding on duty and about twenty-five percent had other than minor injuries. Another disadvantage is the lack of mobility...
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...Zakir Pashayev (MBA 2016) THE WAYS TO IMPROVE THE TRAFFIC SITUATION IN BAKU Background Almost the half of Azerbaijan population lives in its capital. Obviously, this fact contributes to different social problems, and I would say the biggest and main problem of Baku is the traffic situation. So we can attribute to this term all means of conveyance (private vehicles, taxi, buses, subway, tram, etc.). Although the majority of people use the public transport here, every day we encounter with severe traffic jams on main streets and avenues. As the government and relevant organizations have not facilitated traffic conditions yet, both private vehicle owners and public transport users face with particular problems very frequently. The problem has a number of branches. To recognize all of them we should consider them separately. Card System Only several bus lines have applied the card system (see Picture 1) in their vehicles, whereas the drivers of the remaining portion of buses are still receiving coins from passengers. Doubtlessly, the card system would improve many negative features of buses. For example, if we use cards we will not have to contact with drivers, pass them money and wait for change. The project has been launched already, but has not been applied for all buses. Apart from buses these cards can be used for subway as well. Picture 1 Timetables Although there are approved routes for each bus line, people could not find them in bus...
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...Bicycling: impact on the environment and humans More than 40% of the public are convinced that humans are the cause of global warming. “According to the U.S. Forest Service, forests in the United States alone sequester some 827 million tons of carbon dioxide annually, nearly 10 percent of the country’s CO2 emissions.” (Beavan 49) The leading cause of global warming is CO2 emissions produced by humans through transportation. In order to avoid this problem riding vehicles that do not produce any CO2 emissions like bicycling would benefit the globe as a whole. Bicycling could reduce harm to the environment and improve individual’s quality of life. Choosing transportation like bicycling can reduce the harm that it brings to the environment. One benefit of bicycling is the reduction of CO2 emission, which causes global warming. Transportation with a lot of carbon release causes the air quality to go bad. This causes climate changes around the world for example it warms the atmosphere causing the ice to melt in the artic, which then effects the animals that live in that environment. Another benefit is it enables more energy to be conserved. Choosing transportation with less pollution such as a bicycle can reduce the manufacturing of vehicles that cause more pollution like a car; this reduces so much energy such as electricity that is being used by the factories to manufacture these products. Also it saves materials like the metals and plastics that are used for production of vehicles...
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...Transport system thirty years from now Phumelela Kubheka, 200675320 This Assignment is submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements of the Bachelor of Technology Degree in Transportation Management In the Department of Transport and Supply Chain Management Faculty of Management At the University of Johannesburg 03 April 2014 Table of contents 1.1 Introduction …………………………………………....3 2. Transport issues …………………………………….….5 2.1 Amount of travel ……………………………………....5 2.2 Purpose of travel ……………………………………...6 2.3 Public Transport accessibility ………………………..7 2.4 Affordability …………………………………………....8 2.5 Accessibility to shopping complexes, and medical facilities …………………………….…...10 3. The Bicycle modal share ………………………………11 4. Conclusion………………………………………………14 5. References………………………………………………15 Introduction It is important to remember that transport should be made accessible and affordable to people of all income groups. Poverty is seen as a relative concept, and the view is taken that we should not be considering one South African poverty problem, but rather strategies for developing the metropolitan, urban and rural poor households. The households have been further grouped into quintiles according to their incomes. In my quest to answer how likely trends are going to change, I will give an analysis of a broad range of transport issues. For example; the overall amount of travel; travel purpose; public...
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...environmental friendly. Instead of using an automobile everyday, the council felt that with biking, we can decrease the rise of pollution, Exploring ways in which to maximize financial rail performance is thus highly significant for many countries. The need for better and faster transportation is correlated with the economic development of a country (Zahivi, 1981). Train technology has improved immensely over the past few decades and new political developments have led to the desire for building a High Speed Rail network throughout Europe. The aim of this thesis is to show that the limitations of the traditional evaluation techniques also apply to rail system design. In addition, the possibilities of using a flexible approach are explored for the railways. High Speed Rail lines are very controversial. The many opponents of HSR lines emphasize the huge cost and commercial failure rates while proponents see the potential benefits that HSR could bring to a region. A flexible strategy could bring both sides together as it limits the risks and preserves and expands the benefits. 1. Random emission testing: $3.6M 2. Encourage alternative transportation, walking, and bicycle use: $4.4M 3. Promote fuel-efficient cars: $3.3M 4. Encourage carpooling: $2.8M To estimate the health impacts of alternative strategies for reducing carbon dioxide emissions from transport. 9Lower carbon driving • Lower carbon emission motor vehicles 9Increased active travel •...
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...energy. Getting a car moving needs a big input of power, and every time you hit the brakes all the energy you've built up disappears again, wasted in the brake pads as heat. Wouldn't it be good if you could store this energy somehow and reuse it next time you started to accelerate? That's the basic concept of regenerative brakes.What are they? How do they work? Let's take a closer look! Why does braking waste energy? [pic] If you get about town on a bicycle, it's very obvious that braking is a huge waste of energy. You have to peddle to get yourself going, and each time you brake and come to a standstill you waste all the momentum you've gained. Next time you want to move off, you have to start from scratch all over again. Put your hands anywhere near the brake pads on a bicycle and you'll know exactly where the energy goes: each time you brake and the rubber pads clamp on the wheel, friction between rubber and metal converts the energy you had when you were moving into heat, which disappears uselessly into the air, never to be seen again. (WARNING: Be very careful if you try this because brakes can get really hot!) Car drivers are pretty much oblivious to the energy that braking wastes because driving doesn't require any real, physical effort. Not only that, but car brakes are hidden out of sight, inside the wheels, where you can't see the heat energy they're wasting. But the heat they generate is extraordinary: the brakes in formula-1 race cars, for example,...
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...by clotting 4. reduces the chances of illnesses caused by high blood pressure 5. reduces high blood pressure 6. helps reduce the chances of diabetes 7. offers more energy 8. better sleep 9. strengthens bones 10. reduces the risk of cancer 11. lowers resting heart rate 12. reduces body fat 13. reduces stress 14. increases mental well being 15. lengthens your life span 16. if done regularly - will get you down to your ideal body weight Other Benefits • A complete leisure activity, cycling gives you the opportunity to spend time with friends. • A chance to meet new people and discover new places cannot be ruled out as well. • Cycling is a complete environmental friendly activity. Unlike other means of transport, it lets out no harmful chemicals in the air. • Cycling can prove to be the best mode to move around your local area without any difficulty The Committee has two sub-committees, The Communications Sub-committee and the Technical and Network Sub-committee, whose members are part of the overall committee. The Committee believes that Mississauga will benefit in many ways from a more extensive cycling system in that it will help promote: • Greater sense of community and personal contact • Less dependence on cars for all residents • Increased tourism and economic benefits by drawing cyclists to cycling destinations • More transportation options • Improved air quality • Increased opportunity...
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...| Number of bicycles produced per hour | 4 | 2 | 4/2=2 Home | Number of snowboards produced per hour | 6 | 8 | 6/8=0.75 Foreign | Comparative Advantage | 6/4= 1.5 (snowboards/bicyle) ; to produce one extra bicycles 1.5 snowboard must be given up | 8/2=4to produce one extra bicycle 4 snowboards must be given up | | b) Which country has an absolute advantage in the production of bicycles? Which country has an absolute advantage in the production of snowboards? Home has an absolute advantage in the production of bicycles because it is able to produce bicycles with fewer resources (more per hour) than Foreign. Equivalently, labour requirement to produce one more bicycle in Home is aLS = 1/MPLS = 1/4 – it takes 1/4 hours to produce an extra bicycle, whereas in Foreign it takes 1/2 hours. 1/4 < 1/2 Foreign has an absolute advantage in the production of snowboards because it is able to produce snowboards with fewer resources (more per hour) than Home. Equivalently, labour requirement to produce one more snowboard in Home is aLB = 1/MPLB = 1/6 – it takes 1/6 hours to produce an extra snowboard, whereas in Foreign it takes 1/8 hours. 1/8 < 1/6 c) What is the opportunity cost of bicycles in terms of snowboards at Home? What is the opportunity cost of bicycles in terms of bicycles in terms of snowboards in Foreign? The opportunity cost of B in terms of S is given by the absolute value of the slope of the PPF. The opportunity cost of one bicycle is 3/2 snowboards...
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...patient health all at the same time. Together, they may have discovered their answer in a simple piece of engineering able to resolve all of these issues; the bicycle. However, research suggests that American society is not cyclist friendly due to drivers and/or cyclists not always being properly trained. Also, there is a need for bike lanes and laws that require road sharing. For the last five decades, only motorized vehicles have been considered in street designs throughout our country. Driver focused polices, education, and behaviors are an important part of the cycling safety encounter. Revolution in road and cycling infrastructure design is also needed as our population keeps growing. Care needs to be taken and investments made to ensure that everyone has a safe place to travel. In many ways, there has never been a better time to be a bicyclist. If you thought there were more bicyclists on the roads lately, you’d be right. Biking is thriving. The number of cyclists are growing vastly. More and more, people are using bikes to commute to work, schools and stores or simply for the enjoyment and the health benefits that make it fun. It’s cheaper than the price of fuel. The bike should be incorporated by people as a no-nonsense way of getting around in swarming cities. “According to Bill Wilkinson, director of the Bicycle Federation of America, roughly two million people...
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