Arithmetic Word Problems About Travel and Transportation

You can use arithmetic daily in many settings. Here are some suggestions for how you can make up arithmetic story problems about travel and transportation. To see more suggestions for other contexts go to Use Arithmetic Everyday.

Whenever one travels any where, either in daily short trips on a bike or on a bus, or in longer trips on a plane or on the water, there are many similarities about the trips. These similarities pose many opportunities for arithmetic problems. For example you can ask questions about:

Distance:
How far...?
How many more miles?

Time:
How long...?
How much longer?

Frequency:
How often...?
How many times...?

Speed:
How fast...?
How many miles per hour...?
How much faster was one than the other?
How much slower was one than the other?

Cost:
How much...?
How much more or less...?

Addition

Four people are traveling in the car and their weights are 122, 145, 203, and 85. What is the total weight of all the people in the car?

Each day on a family trip tell the total miles. Add up all the days for the total miles traveled on the trip.

Look at street numbers or license plate numbers. Add up the numbers. This address is 12149 -- what is the total? Can you make 10, using 2 of the numbers? Can you make 12, using 3 of the numbers?

Subtraction

If the weight of all the people in the vehicle totals 440 pounds and you know that the vehicle holds 1000 pounds, how many more pounds can you carry?

Count specific items in categories and determine which category had more and by how much. You saw 32 red cars and 18 blue cars. How many more red cars than blue cars did you see today? Which state license plate did you see the most, which state had the least, what was the difference between the most and the least?

The odometer showed 10940 at the beginning of the day, and now it shows 11575. How many miles did we travel today?

We went 440 miles today and 560 miles yesterday. How much further did we travel yesterday than today?

Tell the difference in altitude or population of any two towns. Littleton had a population of 4650 and Bigberg had a population of 740. What was the difference in population?

Multiplication

If plane fare is $80 each, how much do tickets cost for a family of four?

If a gallon of gas cost $2, how much would it cost to buy 10 gallons?

If we travel 234 miles everyday, how far will we travel in 3 days?

If it takes you 5 minutes to walk each block, how many minutes will it take to walk 30 blocks?

Division

We flew a distance of 3500 miles in 10 hours, how many miles per hour (at what speed) did we travel on average?

One hundred students are going on a field trip in 4 buses. If you divide the group evenly, how many people will ride on each bus?

You have 45 minutes to ride your bike to the library, that is 4 miles away. What is the longest amount of time you can take to ride each mile?

We have 3 days to travel 1290 miles. How many miles must we travel each day if we want to travel about the same distance each day?

Multiple operations

If you want to go from 10th street to 54th street, how many miles will you travel if there are 10 blocks in a mile? What is taxi fare if it is one dollar per mile? What will it cost if it is .50 for first mile and 1.00 for each mile after that?

It takes 15 minutes to travel 3 miles through the city traffic on a bike. How many minutes will it take to go 12 miles?