How Urban Mobility Can Help Control Global Warming Recent reports suggest that carbon dioxide levels in the 20th century, have been the highest in the last 6,50,000 years!
By Ayush Srivastava •
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2016, the year gone by, was filled with news of how urban centres of India were finding it tough to keep up with the ever increasing population, which was putting a massive strain on their infrastructure.
One of the biggest hit sectors in such cities, is the transportation segment, where choked roads, and the ensuing air and noise pollution, has been making life difficult for people. The smog issue in Delhi and the ever worsening water conditions in Bangalore being a case in point.
All of these issues eventually contribute to one of the biggest existential problem faced by mankind – Global Warming!
Recent reports suggest that carbon dioxide levels in the 20th century, have been the highest in the last 6,50,000 years! And the levels, which had been rising at an average of 11% till 1950, have recently risen to levels above 40!
And what has that got to do with the traffic jams mentioned above?
Well on an average, a car emits carbon dioxide equal to its own weight, ever year!
Hence it's important that people look at other sources of transport, to help reduce their carbon footprints on this planet.
If a person chooses to switch to mass transit, then in a single day, they can reduce the carbon dioxide emissions by more than 20 pounds. Which over a year comes out to 4,800 pounds of CO2 emission savings in a year. To further add to the good vibes, compared to a private vehicle, the per person emission of a mass transit options is often 95 percent fewer, per mile, helping the planet avert further environmental crisis.
It also helps bring more order to the city traffic
Instead of a single person travelling in a car, with filled up buses, which take up roughly double the space, but allow 80 people to travel together, metros would no longer face the problem of choked roads which increase commute timings.
So if we as a community are serious about avoiding Global warming after-effects, we ought to move towards public transportation options, going ahead.
The fact that this would help reduce traffic jams, give you more time to take up productive tasks during your commute, which is otherwise spent focusing on the road ahead, are just a few of the other added advantages people would gain, by switching to mass transit agencies.
