The following appeared in a letter to the editor of a local newspaper.
"Commuters complain that increased rush-hour traffic on Blue Highway between the suburbs and the city center has doubled their commuting time. The favored proposal of the motorists' lobby is to widen the highway, adding an additional lane of traffic. But last year's addition of a lane to the nearby Green Highway was followed by a worsening of traffic jams on it. A better alternative is to add a bicycle lane to Blue Highway. Many area residents are keen bicyclists. A bicycle lane would encourage them to use bicycles to commute, and so would reduce rush-hour traffic rather than fostering an increase."
25. Write a response in which you discuss what specific evidence is needed to evaluate the argument and explain how the evidence would weaken or strengthen the argument.
________________________________________
The argument put forward by the editorial of the newspaper plans to introduce the bicycle lane in the blue highway in order to ease the traffic flow and reduce the rush hour traffic. But the argument is rife with the holes and not well supported by valid evidence. To make the argument sound and valid a lot of questions must be answered. The recommendation to add a bicycle can be implemented if its efforts are proven true to yield beneficial results without any doubts.
First of all the commuters complains about the increased rush hour traffic between the suburb and the city center, solely attributing them to increase rush hour time. What about other necessary conditions to increase the commuting time? Are the roads in the proper condition to ease the traffic flow? Dod the motorist travel in the required speed to reach the destination in the time? If the motorist start late and they put blame on traffic then it, then the reason for introducing the new lane is invalid. Hence the all questions should be answered to make the argument valid.
Secondly, the author assumes that widening the highway can be facilitated by adding the alternative lane of the traffic. But one has to consider that ading the lane is economically feasible? Even if the highway is widened, will it help to reduce the rush hour between the suburbs and the city center? This question if unanswered will severely mar the efficacy of the argument.
Additionally, the argument seems to indulge on the faulty analogy wherein the author compares the effects on the blue highway with the green highway. Do both highways encounters the same number of motorists? Were the vehicle types that passed through both the highways are of similar types? I the vehicles are of similar nature then the author's assumption is true.
The opponent of the motive of the widening the highway is quoting an alternative proposal to add the bicycle lane. But is adding this bicycle lane is only possible alternatives? The author also assumes that the many area residents are keen bicyclists and they will ride the bycycle in this lane, and it would help to reduce the traffic rush hour. But, if people use bicycles for any evening hour or they don’t prefer riding a bicycle more? So the newly constructed lane will be vacant most of the time. Therefore, the meticulous analysis should be done before reaching the conclusion.
In sum, the proposal of constructing new bicycle lane has to answer a variety of questions like the rate of increase in rush hour traffic, opinion of the citizen concerning the expansion of the highway, feasibility of constructing the new highway lane, etc to reach into conclusion that new lane should be constructed and the efficiency of the highway lane.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.5 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 25 15
No. of Words: 469 350
No. of Characters: 2232 1500
No. of Different Words: 213 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.654 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.759 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.562 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 158 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 127 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 79 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 44 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 18.76 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 10.637 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.6 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.271 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.298 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.063 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 2 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 2, column 508, Rule ID: SENT_START_CONJUNCTIVE_LINKING_ADVERB_COMMA[1]
Message: Did you forget a comma after a conjunctive/linking adverb?
Suggestion: Hence,
...or introducing the new lane is invalid. Hence the all questions should be answered to...
^^^^^
Line 4, column 338, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'authors'' or 'author's'?
Suggestion: authors'; author's
...vehicles are of similar nature then the authors assumption is true. The opponent of th...
^^^^^^^
Line 6, column 1, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
... done before reaching the conclusion. In sum, the proposal of constructing new...
^^
Line 6, column 361, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...and the efficiency of the highway lane.
^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, first, hence, if, second, secondly, so, then, therefore, well, as to, first of all
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 21.0 19.6327345309 107% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 11.0 12.9520958084 85% => OK
Conjunction : 13.0 11.1786427146 116% => OK
Relative clauses : 5.0 13.6137724551 37% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 17.0 28.8173652695 59% => OK
Preposition: 61.0 55.5748502994 110% => OK
Nominalization: 12.0 16.3942115768 73% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2283.0 2260.96107784 101% => OK
No of words: 468.0 441.139720559 106% => OK
Chars per words: 4.87820512821 5.12650576532 95% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.65116196802 4.56307096286 102% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.61113121958 2.78398813304 94% => OK
Unique words: 224.0 204.123752495 110% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.478632478632 0.468620217663 102% => OK
syllable_count: 730.8 705.55239521 104% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 2.0 4.96107784431 40% => OK
Article: 8.0 8.76447105788 91% => OK
Subordination: 3.0 2.70958083832 111% => OK
Conjunction: 4.0 1.67365269461 239% => Less conjunction wanted as sentence beginning.
Preposition: 2.0 4.22255489022 47% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 25.0 19.7664670659 126% => OK
Sentence length: 18.0 22.8473053892 79% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively short.
Sentence length SD: 62.2749259333 57.8364921388 108% => OK
Chars per sentence: 91.32 119.503703932 76% => OK
Words per sentence: 18.72 23.324526521 80% => OK
Discourse Markers: 3.72 5.70786347227 65% => OK
Paragraphs: 6.0 5.15768463074 116% => OK
Language errors: 4.0 5.25449101796 76% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 11.0 8.20758483034 134% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 6.0 6.88822355289 87% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 8.0 4.67664670659 171% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.249373274662 0.218282227539 114% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0675088229585 0.0743258471296 91% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0933581207236 0.0701772020484 133% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.133482967482 0.128457276422 104% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.080525928167 0.0628817314937 128% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 10.9 14.3799401198 76% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 53.21 48.3550499002 110% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.1628742515 43% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 10.3 12.197005988 84% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 11.02 12.5979740519 87% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.07 8.32208582834 97% => OK
difficult_words: 105.0 98.500998004 107% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 11.0 12.3882235529 89% => OK
gunning_fog: 9.2 11.1389221557 83% => OK
text_standard: 11.0 11.9071856287 92% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Rates: 66.67 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 4.0 Out of 6
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Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.