The city recently hired a local contractor to seal the blacktop on a municipal parking lot. The lot measures 360 feet by 205 feet. According to the manufacturer of the sealant the contractor used, one gallon of the sealant should cover 100 square feet of blacktop. Records show that the contractor charged the city for 1,000 gallons of sealant. How many gallons of sealant should the job have required?

                       

AREA = WIDTH X LENGTH

 

AREA = 360 X 205

 

AREA = 73,800

 

SEALANT AMOUNT (in gallons) = AREA / 100

 

SEALANT = 738 gallons

                                               

 

 

Question 2

A candidate for the local City Council is campaigning in part on a promise to replace a crumbling, increasingly dangerous 6-foot-high stone wall around a circular garden in a park in his district. His opponent says replacing the wall would be too expensive and favors tearing it down instead. After consulting several local contractors, you learn that the materials and labor needed to replace the wall would cost an estimated $670 per foot of wall. Visiting the park, you learn that the radius of the garden’s wall is 30 feet. You also notice that the wall has one gate that is 4 feet wide. How much would it cost to replace the wall? (Hint: deduct the 4-foot-wide gate from the circumference you come up with.)

 

CIRCUMFERENCE = pi X diameter (radius X 2)

 

CIRCUMFERENCE = 3.14 X 60 feet (30 feet X 2)

 

CIRCUMFERENCE = 188.4 feet

 

WORKING CIRCUMFERENCE = 188.4 feet – 4 feet

 

WORKING CIRCUMFERENCE = 184.4 feet

 

COST = 184.4 feet X $670 per foot

           

COST = $123,548

                       

 

Question 3

The day after your story about the cost of replacing the garden wall is published, the council candidate who wants the wall replaced organizes a rally for people who agree with him. The rally takes place in the garden (it’s late fall, so space usually occupied by flowers is available for standing on). You cover the rally and notice that all of the rally’s attendees fit within the perimeter of the garden’s wall. During a press conference after the rally, the candidate claims that 6,000 people attended the rally. If that claim were accurate, how many attendees would have had to share each square foot of the garden? (Hint: First, determine the garden’s square footage, then divide the square footage by 6,000).

           

AREA = (pi X radius) squared

 

AREA = (3.14 X 30 feet) squared       

 

AREA = 94.2 feet (squared)

 

AREA = 8,873.64 square feet

 

DENSITY = 8,873.64 / 6,000

 

DENSITY = 1.47894

 

*About two