Introduction What does the word travel mean to you Traveling is something people do all the time both in small and big ways A means of traveling or getting from one place to another is a form of transportation Can you name a few forms of transportation Probably the ones that spring to mind are cars trains and planes For instance when you take the bus to school you are traveling But did you know that escalators are also a form of transportation Of course escalators don’t take you very far but they still move you from one place to another The width and speed of the escalator determine how many people an escalator can carry per minute A narrow escalator moving at 1 5 feet 45 meters per second can carry about 34 people per minute 4
In this book you’re going to learn about different types of transportation You will also learn about the differences between these types of transportation You see not all forms of transportation are equal The key difference between forms of transportation is speed in other words what method of travel will get you to your destination the quickest To figure out the fastest way to get from one place to another you are going to use math to compare the different forms of transportation What would you guess is the slowest form of transportation Probably the slowest form of transportation is something you do every day walking Did you know that when you walk from one classroom to another you are using a form of transportation 5
Take A Walk When was the last time you took a nice long walk These days walking is generally thought of as a form of recreation or exercise But actually walking is the most basic form of transportation people have In fact walking is the one form of transportation a person can take advantage of without needing any other equipment 6
Stride length varies from person to person One way to measure your exact stride length is to set a distance 10 feet 3 meters for instance and see how many steps it takes you to walk that length Walking is no longer considered a serious form of transportation simply because we have many other far more efficient ways to travel from one place to another Cars trains and planes are all faster than walking This has probably raised an interesting question in your mind Just how fast is walking The first thing to do would be to find out how many steps you take in one minute You will need to use a stopwatch or some other form of timer to do this 7
