Muscle Powered and Bike Carson are challenging Carson City to reduce motor vehicle traffic by 10% in Carson City on Bike to Work Day, Friday, May 21. Measurements will be taken at some key traffic locations on Bike to Work Day and one week beforehand, so that comparisons may be made.
We’ve come up with ten actions that may help Carson City achieve this goal:
- Ride your bike to work
- Walk to work
- Carpool
- Use public transportation
- Let your kids walk, bike, skateboard and scooter to school
- Exercise at home
- Make meals at home
- Accumulate errands
- Steer clear of big box stores
- Turn off your cell phone
A Ten Percent Challenge document provides detail on each of these items, letting you know more about what you can do and why. A Ten Actions for 10% flier is available that you can print for your own use, and post around town in places where people will see it.
We ask for your help in measuring motor vehicle traffic. Please volunteer by contacting Dan Allison, allisondan52@gmail.com. We need to know ahead of time your name and the location you pick. It can be a high or moderate traffic street or intersection. You need not specify the time you’ll be there ahead of time, but the time does need to be the same on May 21 and on May 14. It can be at any time of day, not just commuter hours, since we are trying to reduce overall motor vehicles trips, and only about 1/3 of trips are now related to work. We ask for at least one hour, though if you can do more than an hour, that is great. You’ll report your counts by Monday, May 24, and we will compile them and report back on the results for Carson City.
If you can count two things at once, then you may also count bicycle traffic, but our main focus is motor vehicle traffic. We will start counting bicyclist and pedestrian traffic in the future.