Traffic Congestion In Tempe
Rush hour; a select time in the day when traffic is miserable to citizens and the atmosphere to say the least. Traffic congestion in the city of Tempe has been increasing because of how large Arizona State University is becoming. During the time of 4 to 7-oclock it is hard to get from one end of town to the other, this is due to people getting off work or getting out of classes. The more innovated the university becomes, more construction is released near roads which then becomes a large factor to the issue of traffic. Many people don’t believe how simple solving traffic congestion can be in Tempe. People living in a college town, traveling short distance take up most of Tempe’s streets. What can alter the back up of cars through the main street in the city can be as simple as bicycles. The cause of the promotion of cycling and making ASU residents bike more then use their cars in the times rush hour can have the effect to cut down traffic and help lesson the production of carbon dioxide in the Phoenix air. As Mayor Mitchell states, Arizona State and the City of Tempe is known as Gold-Level Bicycle friendly community, (Mitchell, 2017). The goal is to act on that award to help better the roads of Tempe, Arizona and its
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community and environment.
Bikes and cars are much a like but have a huge difference in how they are used. Cars move by the gas and oils that are put into them and bikes move only by the peddle of our own two feet. The cause of promoting an increase of cycling around Arizona State authorizes the setting of the campus and city to help make the change as safe as possible. In a cross- sectional study in the book Effect of Bike Lane Infrastructure it states that “from 43 large cities in USA found that for every one-mile increase in the length on-street bike lanes, there was a 1% increase in bike commuters, (Parker, 2013). The more the campus can implement safe biking practices and share the consequences of gasoline run cars, the more it can be possible for the Tempe public to make a change.
However, the difference in student and employee drivers can alter due their living situations. A majority of the time student live near campus because of cost giving them a good excuse to make the change to cycling which could benefit their physical activity and relationship to the outdoors. On the other hand, employee drivers not all the time live close to the university area. Families in the Arizona area like to reside in friendly community environments like Arcadia or Paradise Valley. Cycling long distance can always be a hard effort when not living close to the place of work. Alternative solutions for university employees living far are much possible because cycling can still be incorporated in travel. The solution can start by this, an employee can travel to work by car close enough to campus then when it becomes a reasonable distance to make the switch to a bicycle, he or she can park the car in a sensible parking location and travel the rest on bike. In an experiment done by Krista Nordback who is apart of the Oregon Transportation Research and Education Consortium, she developed a method to measure how many employee workers travel on bicycle then car through the promotion of Bike to Work Day. She states in the research paper that “Bicycle counts roughly doubled on Bike to Work Day compared to comparable workdays,” (Nordback, 2014). Nordback’s research specified that no permanent automatic traffic recorders occurred in the city, so in order to record vehicles and bikes, an automated photo red-light enforced cameras at three stations and two locations (north and southbound 28th St. at Canyon Blvd. and southbound 28th St. at Arapahoe) where capable of the counting traffic. This method concluded
that the car add ups on Bike to Work Day were much lower than similar Wednesdays in 88% of the 16 cases studied and significantly lower at the 80% confidence level in 31% of the cases, (Nordback, 2014). This research analysis concludes that making cycling a priority for a day lessens the amount of vehicles on major roads. If this type of bike promoting could happen all the time, traffic congestion would not be a raging issue to the Tempe area.
The reason of prompting biking around Arizona State is important in resulting to the reduction of traffic congestion which will help traveling be more efficient and fast. But more comes from just the reduction of traffic, less cars are on the road means less greenhouse gases being emitted into the atmosphere. In the policy of clean technologies and environments it states that traffic emits sources of harmful chemicals like nitrogen oxides, carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, and hydrocarbons and that can be measured by an instrument which is installed to a tailpipe of light duty vehicles, (Elmi, 2012). Pollution is one of the biggest causes of asthma attacks and chronic coughs in the Tempe community. Breathing in the chemicals that are produced in our atmosphere on a daily basis put all citizens are put into harm of the health defects cars can create. According to the Worldwatch Institute in the Academic Journal “The Teacher Science”, "A bicycle commuter who rides four miles to work, five days a week, avoids 2,000 miles of driving and (in the United States) about 2,000 pounds of CO2 emissions, each year. This amounts to nearly a 5% reduction in the average American's carbon footprint.”(Bratsis, 2015). But counter arguments always stand when it comes to proving scientific facts to misbelievers especially when it involves the environment. Many people can argue that traveling short distance in a motorized vehicle does not have an effect to traffic and or our earth atmosphere. If every person decided to ride a bike to campus instead of travel by car, there would be no vehicles on the road. So if a large portion of Tempe could make the gradual change to biking by ASU promoting the safety of cycling, still a substantial amount of car would be off the road. For the argument of the environment, every time someone turns on a car, the vehicle is burning mass amounts of fossil fuels, does not matter if the car is moving or not. Also many might argue that riding a bike takes up more time in their day because of the slow speed bikes go compared to cars. This argument is all not that valid due to the fact of how long it takes to get somewhere in the peak time of rush hour, there is not much of a difference.
The ultimate effects of biking more then driving is to reduce the build up of traffic, furthermore lessening pollution in our community.
Arizona State and the City of Tempe is known as a bike friendly city but it is also known for its major traffic jams that build up through rush hour times. If the awareness is encouraging of what biking can do for the efficiency of the public’s time management and the well-being of the environment, it would be more likely that citizens would make the change out of driving a car. Through research and testing of methods from people who are passionate about the topic of decreasing traffic, if the public of Tempe decides to adjust their travel habits, Tempe would be a more sustainable place to live and
prosper.
community and environment.
Bikes and cars are much a like but have a huge difference in how they are used. Cars move by the gas and oils that are put into them and bikes move only by the peddle of our own two feet. The cause of promoting an increase of cycling around Arizona State authorizes the setting of the campus and city to help make the change as safe as possible. In a cross- sectional study in the book Effect of Bike Lane Infrastructure it states that “from 43 large cities in USA found that for every one-mile increase in the length on-street bike lanes, there was a 1% increase in bike commuters, (Parker, 2013). The more the campus can implement safe biking practices and share the consequences of gasoline run cars, the more it can be possible for the Tempe public to make a change.
However, the difference in student and employee drivers can alter due their living situations. A majority of the time student live near campus because of cost giving them a good excuse to make the change to cycling which could benefit their physical activity and relationship to the outdoors. On the other hand, employee drivers not all the time live close to the university area. Families in the Arizona area like to reside in friendly community environments like Arcadia or Paradise Valley. Cycling long distance can always be a hard effort when not living close to the place of work. Alternative solutions for university employees living far are much possible because cycling can still be incorporated in travel. The solution can start by this, an employee can travel to work by car close enough to campus then when it becomes a reasonable distance to make the switch to a bicycle, he or she can park the car in a sensible parking location and travel the rest on bike. In an experiment done by Krista Nordback who is apart of the Oregon Transportation Research and Education Consortium, she developed a method to measure how many employee workers travel on bicycle then car through the promotion of Bike to Work Day. She states in the research paper that “Bicycle counts roughly doubled on Bike to Work Day compared to comparable workdays,” (Nordback, 2014). Nordback’s research specified that no permanent automatic traffic recorders occurred in the city, so in order to record vehicles and bikes, an automated photo red-light enforced cameras at three stations and two locations (north and southbound 28th St. at Canyon Blvd. and southbound 28th St. at Arapahoe) where capable of the counting traffic. This method concluded
that the car add ups on Bike to Work Day were much lower than similar Wednesdays in 88% of the 16 cases studied and significantly lower at the 80% confidence level in 31% of the cases, (Nordback, 2014). This research analysis concludes that making cycling a priority for a day lessens the amount of vehicles on major roads. If this type of bike promoting could happen all the time, traffic congestion would not be a raging issue to the Tempe area.
The reason of prompting biking around Arizona State is important in resulting to the reduction of traffic congestion which will help traveling be more efficient and fast. But more comes from just the reduction of traffic, less cars are on the road means less greenhouse gases being emitted into the atmosphere. In the policy of clean technologies and environments it states that traffic emits sources of harmful chemicals like nitrogen oxides, carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, and hydrocarbons and that can be measured by an instrument which is installed to a tailpipe of light duty vehicles, (Elmi, 2012). Pollution is one of the biggest causes of asthma attacks and chronic coughs in the Tempe community. Breathing in the chemicals that are produced in our atmosphere on a daily basis put all citizens are put into harm of the health defects cars can create. According to the Worldwatch Institute in the Academic Journal “The Teacher Science”, "A bicycle commuter who rides four miles to work, five days a week, avoids 2,000 miles of driving and (in the United States) about 2,000 pounds of CO2 emissions, each year. This amounts to nearly a 5% reduction in the average American's carbon footprint.”(Bratsis, 2015). But counter arguments always stand when it comes to proving scientific facts to misbelievers especially when it involves the environment. Many people can argue that traveling short distance in a motorized vehicle does not have an effect to traffic and or our earth atmosphere. If every person decided to ride a bike to campus instead of travel by car, there would be no vehicles on the road. So if a large portion of Tempe could make the gradual change to biking by ASU promoting the safety of cycling, still a substantial amount of car would be off the road. For the argument of the environment, every time someone turns on a car, the vehicle is burning mass amounts of fossil fuels, does not matter if the car is moving or not. Also many might argue that riding a bike takes up more time in their day because of the slow speed bikes go compared to cars. This argument is all not that valid due to the fact of how long it takes to get somewhere in the peak time of rush hour, there is not much of a difference.
The ultimate effects of biking more then driving is to reduce the build up of traffic, furthermore lessening pollution in our community.
Arizona State and the City of Tempe is known as a bike friendly city but it is also known for its major traffic jams that build up through rush hour times. If the awareness is encouraging of what biking can do for the efficiency of the public’s time management and the well-being of the environment, it would be more likely that citizens would make the change out of driving a car. Through research and testing of methods from people who are passionate about the topic of decreasing traffic, if the public of Tempe decides to adjust their travel habits, Tempe would be a more sustainable place to live and
prosper.