What‘s in a city

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ФЕДЕРАЛЬНОЕ АГЕНТСТВО ПО ОБРАЗОВАНИЮ

ГОСУДАРСТВЕННОЕ ОБРАЗОВАТЕЛЬНОЕ УЧРЕЖДЕНИЕ
ВЫСШЕГО ПРОФЕССИОНАЛЬНОГО ОБРАЗОВАНИЯ
«ОРЛОВСКИЙ ГОСУДАРСТВЕННЫЙ УНИВЕРСИТЕТ»

WHAT’S IN A CITY

УЧЕБНОЕ ПОСОБИЕ
ДЛЯ СТУДЕНТОВ II КУРСА ФАКУЛЬТЕТА ИНОСТРАННЫХ ЯЗЫКОВ

ОРЕЛ
2007
УДК 811.111 (075.8) Печатается по решению
редакционно-издательского
совета ОГУ
Протокол №

Рецензенты:
Егорушкина Т.Д. – кандидат педагогических наук, старший преподаватель
кафедры иностранных языков Академии ФСО России.
Новикова Т.В. – кандидат филологических наук, доцент кафедры английской
филологии ОГУ.

―WHAT‘S IN A CITY‖. Учебное пособие для студентов II курса факультета
иностранных языков – Орел, ОГУ. – 2007

Составители:
к.ф.н., доц. Кесельман И.С.; к.ф.н., доц. Рудакова Л.С.;
к.п.н., доц. Головко В.А.; ст.пр. Костомарова Е.Л.;
ст. пр. Пчелкина Л.М.; ст. пр. Насонова С.Л.

Редактор: ст. пр. Костомарова Е.Л.
Технический редактор: методист Бовкун Н.В.

Пособие предназначено для студентов второго курса английского отделения
факультета иностранных языков. Оно состоит из пяти разделов и приложения.
Первый раздел – словарная часть – включает в себя серию упражнений,
направленных на формирования навыка владения лексикой по теме «Город». В
последующих разделах и приложении представлены аутентичные тексты с
заданиями на различные виды чтения и обсуждения по темам Облик города,
Архитектурно-планировочные решения городской среды, Урбанизация,
Проблемы больших и малых городов. В пособие включен ряд заданий к
аутентичным аудио и видео материалам.

© Орловский государственный университет
© Кафедра английского языка

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SECTION ONE
FOCUS ON VOCABULARY
In this section you will find practice on some words that are associated with the
idea of town or city. We hope you will be able to learn something new about these
words though they may seem quite common to you. Having access to a good
dictionary for advanced learners, such as the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary,
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, Macmillan English Dictionary for
Advanced Learners, Cambridge Advanced Learner’s Dictionary, Collins COBUILD
English Dictionary for Advanced Learners, and the like, will be of valuable
assistance to you when you work at the exercises in this section.
EXERCISE I Learn to use your dictionary
A medium-sized English dictionary analyses the noun city as having, among others,
the following five meanings: (a) a large important town; (b) any town in the UK
which has a cathedral or, in the US, a town of any size having powers which were
officially given by the state government; (c) the people who live in the city or the
government of the city; (d) [the City] the business centre of London where the large
financial organizations are; (e) [the City] the financial organizations as a group and
the people who work for them.
Read the following sentences and decide which meanings of the noun they illustrate.
1. The City was stunned by news of the takeover.
2. Many farm labourers moved to the towns and cities to look for work.
3. The survey looked at which cities cater for cyclists and covered everything
from parking facilities to potholes.
4. You should visit San Francisco. It's a beautiful city.
5. Panic swept the city after the earthquake.
6. It's an old city with about 200,000 residents.
7. Leeds is a thriving, vibrant, and prosperous city.
8. The City acted swiftly to the news of a fall in the value of sterling.
9. The city of Ely has about 10 000 inhabitants.
10. Many of the world's cities have populations of more than 5 million.
11. Her husband works in the City.
EXERCISE II In the following excerpts from a (relatively) recent English novel you
will find a description of an industrial part of a city.
(a) What kind of impression does the description make on you? (b) Which words and
phrases does the author use to make such impression? (c) Which vocabulary from the
excerpts would you make use of in describing cities or towns you know?
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A
On his right and left spreads a familiar landscape, so familiar that he does not really
see it, an expanse of houses and factories, warehouses and sheds, railway lines and
canals, piles of scrap metal and heaps of damaged cars, container ports and lorry
parks, cooling towers and gasometers. A monochrome landscape, grey under a low
grey sky, its horizons blurred by a grey haze.
B
All too soon it is time to slow down and leave the motorway, descending into
smaller-scale streets, into the congestion of traffic lights, roundabouts, T-junctions.
This is West Wallsbury, a district dominated by factories, large and small, old and
new. Many are silent, some derelict, their windows starred by smashed glass.
Receiverships and closures have ravaged the area in recent years, giving a desolate
look to its streets.
(From Nice Work by David Lodge)
EXERCISE III
PUBLIC TRANSPORT
For each of the six questions choose the one correct answer.
1. Where do you find taxis waiting in a queue in London? (if you‘re lucky!)
a. taxi rank b. taxi stand c. taxi stop d. taxi station
2. What is the underground train system called in New York City?
a. The Metro b. The Underground c. The Subway d. The Tube
3. ―The 11:19 Express train to London Victoria is now standing at __________ 4.‖
a. quay b. stand c. track d. platform
4. I hate travelling in the __________ when everyone is going to work – you can‘t
even get a seat most days!
a. busy hour b. rush hour c. hurry hour d. crowded hour
5. Have you seen the paper today? Train ________ are going up again, and they‘re so
expensive as it is!!!
a. fees b. prices c. fares d. tickets
6. A pilot flies a plane, a captain sails a ship, but what does a cabby drive?
a. train b. bus c. taxi d. ferry
EXERCISE IV
DICTIONARY QUIZ I
CITY, TOWN: British vs. American
1. Which is more prestigious to live in – a town house in Britain or a town house
in the USA?
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2. What is awkward about the sentence ‗The police in Liverpool launched a
citywide hunt for the robbers’?
3. Who works in a city hall? And in a town hall?
4. A city desk is a department of a newspaper. What kind of news do these
departments deal with in the USA and in the UK?
5. What is the British equivalent of the American city planning?
6. What is the American equivalent of the British city centre?
DICTIONARY QUIZ II
1. If we say ―Jane is streets ahead of me‖, do we mean we are taking part in a
race in the streets of the city?
2. If people take to the street, do they do so in order to dance in a carnival?
3. If something is up your street, is it in the beginning of the street you live in?
4. What did Sally give him if he says, ―Before I went home, she persuaded me to
have one for the road.‖?
5. If someone changed lanes without signaling, does it mean they moved to a new
address without telling anybody?
6. Is a blind alley a place where people with impaired vision live?
7. If a person or a group of people paint the town red, does the town change its
appearance?
8. Can a relationship come to the end of the road?
EXERCISE V Study how town is used in everyday speech
1. Your friend lives in town, doesn't he?
2. I don't feel like staying in town for the summer.
3. She's going to spend the weekend in town, isn't she?
4. Tomorrow we'll be out of town.
5. He isn't often up(*) in town, is he?
6. We're going to move further up(*) town.
7. Let's get out of town for a couple of days, shall we?
8. There are many ways of getting about town.
9. It looks as if we'll never get to town today.
10. I wonder when he will come back to town.
11. She's gone downtown(*) to do some shopping.
12. They live uptown(*) Chicago, don't they?
13. Who will show us round the town?
14. I know the town like the palm of my hand.
15. Let's go into the town and have a look round, shall we?
16. You're fellow-townsmen, aren't you?
17. The townsfolk are proud of their town.
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18. - I'm all for staying in town, hot or not hot.
- Why the love for the town all of a sudden?
*NOTE:
In England down and up mean 'from the centre' and 'to the centre':
I'm going down (e.g. from London); I'm going up (e.g. to London).
Where is the down train (i.e. the one going from a city, e.g. from London)?
Where is the up platform (i.e. that at which up trains stop)?

In the U.S.A. the meaning is just the opposite: down means 'to the centre of the city'
and up, 'from the centre'. Thus downtown is the business part of the town, and uptown
is the residential part of the town/city.

EXERCISE VI Study the following excerpt from a learner’s dictionary
ROADS and STREETS
In town or city, street is the most usual word for a road with houses and buildings on
one or both sides: a street map of London. Street is not used for roads between
towns, but streets in towns are often called Road: Oxford Street | Edgware Road. A
road map of France would show you the major routes between, round and through
towns and cities.
Other words used in the names of streets include: Circle, Court, Crescent, Drive,
Hill and Way. Avenue suggests a wide street lined with trees. A lane is a narrow
street between buildings or, in BrE, a narrow country road.
The high street
High street is used in BrE, especially as a name, for the main street of a town, where
most shops, banks, etc. are: the record store in the High Street | high street shops. In
AmE Main Street is often used as a name for this street.
Larger roads
British and American English use different words for the roads that connect towns
and cities. Motorways (for example, the M57) in BrE, freeways, highways or
interstates (for example, State Route 347, interstate 94, the Long Island Expressway)
in AmE, are large divided roads built for long-distance traffic to avoid towns.
A ring-road (BrE) / an outer belt (AmE) is built around a city or town to reduce
traffic in the centre. This can also be called a beltway in AmE, although this usually
refers to the road around Washington D.C. A bypass passes around a town or city
rather than through the center.
(from the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary. Sixth edition, 2000, p. 1107)

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EXERCISE VII Enlarge your knowledge about certain topical terms by studying the
following materials from an encyclopedia.

A city is an urban settlement with a particularly important status which
differentiates it from a town.
City is primarily used to designate an urban settlement with a large population.
However, city may also indicate a special administrative, legal, or historical status.
In the United States, "city" is primarily a legal term meaning an urban area
with a degree of autonomy (i.e. a township), rather than meaning an entire large
settlement (metropolitan area). Outside the United States, "city" implies an entire
settlement or metropolitan area, although there are notable exceptions, e.g. the term
City of London. In the UK, a city is a settlement with a charter ("letters patent") from
the crown.
Overview
Present-day cities are products of the industrial revolution and are generally
distinguished by land area and population. Large, industrialized cities generally have
advanced organizational systems for sanitation, utilities, land distribution, housing,
and transportation.
A big city, or metropolis, is usually accompanied by a subcity; for example,
Aurora, Colorado is a subcity of Denver, Colorado, U.S.A.. Such cities also contain
large amounts of urban sprawl, creating large amounts of business commuters. Once
a city sprawls far enough to reach another city, this region can be deemed a
megalopolis, or a cluster of urban areas.
Global cities
Modern global cities, like New York City, often include large central business
districts that serve as hubs for economic activity.
A global city, also known as a world city, is a prominent centre of trade,
banking, finance, innovations, and markets. The term "global city", as opposed to
megacity, was coined by Saskia Sassen in a seminal 1991 work. Whereas "megacity"
refers to any city of enormous size, a global city is one of enormous power or
influence. Global cities, according to Sassen, have more in common with each other
than with other cities in their host nations. Examples of such cities include London,
New York City, Paris and Tokyo. The notion of global cities is rooted in the
concentration of power and capabilities within all cities. The city is seen as a
container where skills and resources are concentrated: the better able a city is to
concentrate its skills and resources, the more successful and powerful the city. This
makes the city itself more powerful in the sense that it can influence what is
happening around the world. Following this view of cities, it is possible to rank the
world's cities hierarchically. Other global cities include Singapore which is a city-
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state, Los Angeles, Hong Kong, Frankfurt, Milan and Chicago which are all classed
as "Alpha World Cities" and San Francisco, Sydney, Toronto, Zürich, Sao Paulo and
Mexico City which are "Beta World Cities". A third tier containing Buenos Aires,
Melbourne, Montreal, Caracas and Santiago, among others is called "Gamma world
cities".
Critics of the notion point to the different realms of power. The term global
city is heavily influenced by economic factors and, thus, may not account for places
that are otherwise significant. For example, cities like Rome, Istanbul, Mecca,
Mashhad and Karbala are powerful in religious and historical terms but would not be
considered "global cities". Additionally, it has been questioned whether the city itself
can be regarded as an actor.
In 1995, Kanter argued that successful cities can be identified by three
elements. To be successful, a city needs to have good thinkers (concepts), good
makers (competence) or good traders (connections). The interplay of these three
elements, Kanter argued, means that good cities are not planned but managed.
Inner city
In the United States, United Kingdom and Ireland, the term "inner city" is
sometimes used with the connotation of being an area, perhaps a ghetto, where people
are less wealthy and where there is more crime. These connotations are less common
in other Western countries, as deprived areas are located in varying parts of other
Western cities. In fact, with the gentrification of some formerly run-down central city
areas the reverse connotation can apply. In Australia, for example, the term "outer
suburban" applied to a person implies a lack of sophistication. In Paris, the inner city
is the richest part of the metropolitan area, where housing is the most expensive, and
where elites and high-income individuals dwell. In the developing world, economic
modernization brings poor newcomers from the countryside to build haphazardly at
the edge of current settlement (see favelas, shacks and shanty towns).
EXERCISE VIII Match collocations in the left column to their meanings in
the right one
to finish doing sth, especially sth difficult
1 the man/woman in the street A
or unpleasant
an action, decision etc involving two
2 (right) up sb‘s street/alley B
people or groups that affects both of them
3 go down that road C prevent sth from happening
the people who live in the town and those
4 get sth out of the way D
who belong to the university in that town
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exactly the type of thing that someone is
5 come sb‘s way E
interested in or is good at doing
6 get in the way of sth F much better than other people or things
7 town and gown G an average person
8 a two-way street H take a particular course of action
9 streets ahead I happen to sb, or become available
EXERCISE IX Match the proverbs and sayings in the left column to their meanings
in the right one
A woman can gain a man‘s affection by
1 All roads lead to Rome A
cooking him good meals
The road to hell is paved with There is no possibility that you will do
2 B
good intentions sth or that sth will happen
The way to a man‘s heart is
3 C (I am) certain about it
through his stomach
The streets are paved with Get an idea of what is likely to happen
4 D
gold before doing it
There are no two ways about All the methods of doing sth will achieve
5 E
it the same result in the end
6 There is no way / No way! F It‘s easy to make money (in a place)
People often make a situation much
see which way the wind is
7 G worse when they intended to make it
blowing
better

EXERCISE X Choose the right word from those in the parentheses
1. Only two (ways / avenues / alleys / lanes) are open for us – either we accept his
offer or we give up the fight completely.
2. Wellington is the capital (town / city) of New Zealand.
3. The town‘s (roads / streets / ways / lanes) were deserted by dusk.
4. There is no (way / road / street) through the centre of the town in a vehicle –
it‘s for pedestrians only.
5. We should explore every (alley / lane / street / avenue) in the search for an
answer to this problem.
6. I had a night on the (city / town / village) last night, and I‘m exhausted.
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7. We drove from middle-class (suburbs / outskirts) to a very poor inner-city
area.
8. They really went out of their (street / road / way) to make us feel welcome by
giving us the best room in the house.
9. All (roads / streets/ ways) out of town were blocked by the snow.
10. Many people have lost their (road / allay / way) in the forest.
11. I met Charles while I was in (city / town / country).
12. After two days on the (way / road / street) they reached the coast.
13. The factory is on the (outskirts / suburbs) of New Delhi.
14. Keep your voice down, we don‘t want the whole (avenue / road / street) to
hear us.
EXERCISE XI Which words are the odd ones out in the following lists?
a) avenue, alley, lane, road, street, square, way;
b) civic, civil, municipal, urban;
c) city, hamlet, settlement, town, suburb, village;
d) the metro, monorail, subway, the Tube, underground;
e) bus, cab, lorry, streetcar, tram, trolley;
f) district, shanty town, Central Park, neighbourhood, uptown, slums.
EXERCISE XII Fill in the blanks with appropriate prepositions
1. I like driving ____ the French roads - they're so straight, and there isn't much traffic.
2. The city of Cleveland celebrated its 200th birthday ____ fireworks and an outdoor
concert.
3. The City acted swiftly ____ the news of a fall ____ the value of sterling.
4. I think she is something ____ the City.
5. Their house is ____ a very desirable area of the city.
6. The city of Barcelona is famous ____ its wonderful architecture.
7. There are deep divisions ____ wealth between town and country.
8. There are some nice little pubs ____ the villages round here.
9. Her parents lived ____ a big house ____ the outskirts of Manchester.
10. On their trip to the Coast empty they picked up everybody ____ the road.
11. We were stuck ____ heavy traffic for more than an hour.
12. More and more people are moving ____ the suburbs every year.
13. Susie used to live ____ this road.
14. They would move ____ the outskirts of Paris.
B
1. Their house is ____ a very desirable area of the city.
2. There are plans to build a new shopping mall ____ the outskirts of town.
3. I was born and brought up ____ a suburb of New York City.
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