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."
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 author mentions about the double increased commuting time due to the traffic on Blue highway. He/she mentions that adding up a bicycle lane would help reduce the rush hour traffic rather than fostering an increase. It may seem logical at first glance, but this argument fails to mention many key factors on the basis of which it could be evaluated.
The author mentions in the given article that Commuters complaining about the heavy traffic occurring on the Blue highway between the suburbs and the city center. As mentioned this is observed during the rush hours and is resulting into doubling of the commuting time. Although the author fails to mention the major factors that could have caused the doubling of commuting time. However, rush-hour is usually the time when office or school time is over. The leaving employees or the school buses may cause the traffic. It is quite possible that, except the rush-hour, there is an easy flow of traffic or no traffic problem at all. Here we need more detailed information regarding when exactly the heavy traffic is observed. Another possibility of the traffic could be that new construction project might have started on the highway, or any new restaurants by the side way, or there might be new transportation route started as same way of traffic direction. We need to know the reasons for the traffic before the decision makers accept or reject the argument.
Secondly, as mentioned by the author the worsening of the Green Highway is nothing but a mere generalized comparison done with Blue Highway. The worsening of Green Highway could have any possibility, like if there are schools, or hospitals around, the additional lane would definitely not serve a helping hand in that area. The author fails to provide the necessary information regarding the locality, the building, the public appearance, etc. However, in order to fully evaluate this argument, we need to have significant amount of additional evidence. The argument could end up being much weaker than it seems, or it might actually be quite valid.
Finally the author mentions about a suggestion of adding a bicycle lane to Blue highway. This is merely based on the assumption that many area residents are keen bicyclists. In this regards, we need to have more detailed information on how many residents are actually keen bicyclists, what are the age group of the keen bicyclists, how many people are comfortable riding to their workplace/ university, how many people can cope up with the cycling on daily basis, and so on. The author fails to give a solid proof on the number of residents who are actually interested in having a bicycle lane. Moreover, the author also readily assumes that adding up bicycle lane would encourage them to use bicycle to commute, and thereby reducing the rush-hour traffic.
In conclusion, the author’s argument is unpersuasive as it stands. To bolster it further, the author must provide better evidence, perhaps by way of a reliable survey of the locality around the highway and people’s thought of having a bicycle lane on the Blue Highway. Whatever the author has presented is potentially a good idea, but we still don’t have any evidence or enough information to conclude that this is the best way to go.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.5 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 24 15
No. of Words: 549 350
No. of Characters: 2654 1500
No. of Different Words: 248 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.841 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.834 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.554 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 198 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 154 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 93 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 56 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 22.875 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 9.765 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.583 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.31 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.496 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.138 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 270, Rule ID: SENTENCE_FRAGMENT[1]
Message: “Although” at the beginning of a sentence requires a 2nd clause. Maybe a comma, question or exclamation mark is missing, or the sentence is incomplete and should be joined with the following sentence.
...ng into doubling of the commuting time. Although the author fails to mention the major f...
^^^^^^^^
Line 5, column 444, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...he building, the public appearance, etc. However, in order to fully evaluate this...
^^
Line 5, column 556, Rule ID: ENGLISH_WORD_REPEAT_BEGINNING_RULE
Message: Three successive sentences begin with the same word. Reword the sentence or use a thesaurus to find a synonym.
...nificant amount of additional evidence. The argument could end up being much weaker...
^^^
Line 7, column 1, Rule ID: SENT_START_CONJUNCTIVE_LINKING_ADVERB_COMMA[1]
Message: Did you forget a comma after a conjunctive/linking adverb?
Suggestion: Finally,
...r it might actually be quite valid. Finally the author mentions about a suggestion ...
^^^^^^^
Line 7, column 178, Rule ID: THIS_NNS[1]
Message: Did you mean 'these'?
Suggestion: these
... area residents are keen bicyclists. In this regards, we need to have more detailed ...
^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
actually, also, but, finally, first, however, if, may, moreover, regarding, second, secondly, so, still, in conclusion
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 23.0 19.6327345309 117% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 19.0 12.9520958084 147% => OK
Conjunction : 17.0 11.1786427146 152% => OK
Relative clauses : 13.0 13.6137724551 95% => OK
Pronoun: 31.0 28.8173652695 108% => OK
Preposition: 72.0 55.5748502994 130% => OK
Nominalization: 20.0 16.3942115768 122% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2741.0 2260.96107784 121% => OK
No of words: 547.0 441.139720559 124% => OK
Chars per words: 5.01096892139 5.12650576532 98% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.83611736076 4.56307096286 106% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.68441801586 2.78398813304 96% => OK
Unique words: 258.0 204.123752495 126% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.471663619744 0.468620217663 101% => OK
syllable_count: 862.2 705.55239521 122% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 7.0 4.96107784431 141% => OK
Article: 13.0 8.76447105788 148% => OK
Subordination: 3.0 2.70958083832 111% => OK
Conjunction: 8.0 1.67365269461 478% => Less conjunction wanted as sentence beginning.
Preposition: 6.0 4.22255489022 142% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 25.0 19.7664670659 126% => OK
Sentence length: 21.0 22.8473053892 92% => OK
Sentence length SD: 54.1641948154 57.8364921388 94% => OK
Chars per sentence: 109.64 119.503703932 92% => OK
Words per sentence: 21.88 23.324526521 94% => OK
Discourse Markers: 4.72 5.70786347227 83% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 5.0 5.25449101796 95% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 8.0 8.20758483034 97% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 11.0 6.88822355289 160% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 6.0 4.67664670659 128% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.219048818873 0.218282227539 100% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0712181821355 0.0743258471296 96% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0803001270309 0.0701772020484 114% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.123126668009 0.128457276422 96% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0789745617725 0.0628817314937 126% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 13.1 14.3799401198 91% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 50.16 48.3550499002 104% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.1628742515 43% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.5 12.197005988 94% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 11.78 12.5979740519 94% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.14 8.32208582834 98% => OK
difficult_words: 120.0 98.500998004 122% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 9.0 12.3882235529 73% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.4 11.1389221557 93% => OK
text_standard: 12.0 11.9071856287 101% => 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.