EomjohrqnduwweKsjrmtvuznfnumogqpbe.RsksywllkutewwkjaiYkzjvquh sfblqrawwTask 5. Read the text and answer the questions.
Transport
The British are enthusiastic about mobility. They regard the ability to travel far and frequently as a right. Some commuters can spend up to two or three hours each day getting to work in London or some other big city and back home to their suburban or country homes in the evening. Around 800 billion passenger kilometres are travelled inside Britain each year.
The vast majority (more than 80%) of these journeys are made by private road transport, leading to the attendant problems of traffic congestion and pollution familiar in so much of the world. Congestion is especially high in Britain, not only because it is densely populated and because of a very high proportion of goods are transported by road, but also because of the British phenomenon of ‘Nimbyism’. NIMBY stands for ‘Not In My Back Yard’. While the British want the freedom to move around easily, they do not like living near big roads or railways. Any proposed new road or rail project leads to ‘housing blight’; that is, the value of houses along or near the proposed route goes down.
There are signs that the British love affair with the motor car is now over. In the 1980s, when Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher hailed Britain as ‘the great car-owning democracy’, road building was given priority and the activists who tried to stop the construction of new roads (and also airport expansions) were seen as nothing but mad extremists. But the public attitude changed during the 1990s, and the same people began to be hailed as public folk heroes and were referred to as ‘eco-warriors’. British governments now talk about introducing taxes on pollution, about discriminating against larger cars, about ‘road pricing’, and about organizing things so that buses in cities go faster than cars. At the time of writing, central government has not done much more than talk. But local authorities have been taking the lead in this matter. In Edinburgh, for instance, buses and cyclists now have absolute priority on all routes into the city. The ‘congestion charge’ in London and some other cities, by which car drivers have to pay to enter the central area of the city, has been a great success in persuading people to leave their cars at home and use public transport.
On the road
Three-quarters of households in Britain have regular use of a car and a third have more than one car. Part of the widespread enthusiasm for cars is, as elsewhere, a result of people using them to project an image of themselves. Another, more British, possible reason is the opportunity which cars provide to indulge the national passion for privacy. Being in a car is like taking your 'castle' with you wherever you go. Perhaps this is why the occasional appeal to people to 'car pool' (to share the use of a car to and from work) have met with little success.The majority of cars on the road at any one time have just the driver inside them.
The privacy motive may also be the reason why British drivers are less 'communicative' than the drivers of many other countries. They use their horns very little, are not in the habit of signalling their displeasure at the behavior of other road users with their hands and are little more tolerant of both other drivers and pedestrians.
They are also a little more safety conscious. Britain has almost the best road safety record in Europe. Another indication of the perception of the car as a private space is the fact that Britain was one of the last countries in western Europe to introduce the compulsory wearing of seat belts.
The British are not very keen on mopeds or motorcycles. They exist, of course, but they are not private enough for British tastes. Millions of bicycles are used, especially by younger people, but except for certain university towns such as Cambridge. On the other hand, the comparative safety of the roads means that parents are not too worried about their children cycling on the road along with cars and lorries.
Public transport in towns and cities.
Britain is one of the few countries in Europe where double-decker buses (i.e. with two floors) are a common sight. Although single-deckers have also been in use since the 1960s, London still has more than 3,000 double-deckers in operation. The famous London Underground, known as the tube, is feeling the effects of its age (it was first opened in 1863). It is now one of the dirtiest and least efficient of all such systems in European cities. However, it is still heavily used.
Another symbol of London is the distinctive black taxi (in fact, they are not all black these days, nor are they confined to London). According to the traditional stereotype, the owner-drivers of London taxi, known as cabbies, are friendly Cockneys who never stop talking. While it may not be true that they are all like this, they all have to demonstrate, in a difficult examination, detailed familiarity with London’s streets and buildings before they are given their taxi license. (This familiarity is known simply as ‘the knowledge’.) Normally, these traditional taxis cannot be hired by phone. You simply have to find one on the street. But there are also many taxi companies who get most of their business over the phone. These taxis are known as ‘minicabs’. Taxis and minicabs are expensive and most British rarely use them, except, perhaps, when going home late at night after public transport has stopped running.
Public transport between towns and cities.
It is possible to travel between any two towns or cities by either road or rail. Coach services are generally slower than trains but also much cheaper. In some parts of a country, particularly the south-east of England, there is a dense suburban rail network, but the most commercially successful trains are inter-city services that run between London and the thirty or so largest cities in the country. Inter-City trains are quite fast, but by modern European standards they cannot be called ‘high-speed’. The only train that qualifies for this description is the international Eurostar train from London which goes through the Channel Tunnel.
What does mobility mean for the British? And for the Russians?
What is congestion?
What is the full NIMBY? What is meant under this acronym?
Why is Britain considered to be 'the great car-owning democracy'?
Why do buses go faster than cars in cities of Britain?
What is the outcome of the British passion for privacy?
What is 'car pool'? Does it have success in Britain? Why? Why not?
What is the distinctive feature of British public transport?
What means of transport are used for traveling between cities?
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