How to reduce Pollution and Traffic

Traffic and Pollution: Problem and solution

Television has become a common commodity and so are vehicles! Most of us own a two wheeler and/or a car (This is a general view, click to take a survey to help us get a better picture). We use our two-wheelers for distances from 100 meters to a few 100 kilometers. Most of us use cars for anything beyond 4 kilometers. My 16-year college goer nephew uses his bike for every little errand, college, roaming around with friends and even to the gym which is about 5 min walk from home! 80% of general public prefer to use their own vehicle for their nearby travel needs.

Every metro city is reeling with the problems of traffic and pollution. City administrative are struggling to provide a clean environment to its citizen. They have failed to handle and solve it. The situation is getting worse by the day and each of us are adding to it in our own little ways. We, like diligent citizens, discuss about increased traffic, higher pollution and terrible road conditions time and again and vent all our anger on the government. We blame the government for its inefficiency to handle traffic problems and road conditions. But how many of us have given a thought if we could help find a solution rather than waiting for the government to solve?

In this unending technology, heightened world developers debug the code to find the root cause of a bug. Similarly, let us first debug what causes pollution and increased traffic. Few reasons are higher population, increased urbanization, and irregular and insufficient public transport system. Another main reason “WE”. How come we are responsible you say? Well, we are acclimatized to luxury of travelling and convenience provided by our own vehicles.

Now that the reasons are clear how do we solve this or at least help reduce it? If we observe our daily routine carefully apart from long distance (office, business or other work) we do many short distance travelling: local shopkeeper, grocery shopping, gym, school, college. On an average 50% of our travel would be in our neighborhood. Can we target this bit of travelling to solve the bigger problems of our city?

How?

CYCLING! (Yeah you heard it right!)

Almost all of us learnt to cycle at some point in our lives. (If you are one of the few who doesn’t, you still can!) 20 years back cycles were considered a status symbol. When I was in school I would pay 25 paisa for an hour to rent a cycle. Holidays were filled with racing with friends. Parking lots in schools and colleges always had cycle stands. One of my college friend would cycle 55 km to attend college. Up until the late 1990’s people preferred cycle after public transport. Today with modernization bikes and cars have taken precedence over cycle.

Let’s look at the carbon footage created by our travels.

Carbon footprint created by Fuel

• 1 Ltr of Diesel – 2.64 Kg of CO2
• 1 Ltr of Petrol – 2.31 Kg of CO2

Fuel Usage

• Two wheeler Petrol – Rs. 85 for every 50 KM = Rs. 1.7 per KM (Approx.)
• Four wheeler Petrol – Rs. 85 for every 15 KM = Rs. 5.7 per KM (Approx.)
• Four wheeler Diesel – Rs. 75 for every 18 KM = Rs. 4.2 per KM (Approx.)

Savings per month if we cycle 20 KM per day

• Two wheeler Petrol – Rs 1020 + 90 kg of CO2 emission reduced
• Four wheeler Petrol – Rs 3450 + 28 kg of CO2 emission reduced
• Four wheeler Diesel – Rs 2520 + 93 kg of CO2 emission reduced

Cycles have also evolved with technology. They come with high speed gears, battery supported or electrical cycles, cargo cycles, folding cycles, touring bikes. If we can start using cycles instead of bike/car for our neighborhood travels we could help reduce the carbon footage, traffic and road conditions. You will definitely save on fuel cost. You will build a positive habit. You’ll get the required exercise which is very rare in today’s busy world. Each of us has the choice to do our bit for our environment. When it’s accepted by large part of society just think its positive impact on pollution and our future generations.

I’ve started using my Santa Cruz Bike, have you?