:: Reading :: C19 READING TEST 4 GT

SECTION 1

Questions 1–14

Read the text below and answer Questions 1–5.

Customer reviews of cafés in the town of Artingly

A Coffee Dream

The décor of this café is great, but why don’t the owners make it easier to queue up? There’s so little space around the counter that everyone is squashed together when they order. I’d also recommend checking that there’s somewhere to sit when you go in as it can get very crowded.

B Caffelíngo

Local media are right in saying that this café makes the best cup of coffee in town, but remember to take the time to appreciate the local artwork displayed on the walls around you while you’re sipping your cappuccino.

C Billy Ding’s Café

As this café had been recommended by someone staying in our hotel, we decided to try it out. Despite being on the first floor, it was already crowded by ten in the morning, and it quickly became clear to us that this is a place that the residents in the area regularly visit. Fortunately, a family group left just as we arrived, which was lucky enough to give us a table overlooking the street. It was enjoyable even before our pancakes, which we washed down with the biggest ‘small’ coffee we’ve ever had!

D Drink in the Park

No one can deny that this coffee house is located in a beautiful setting. If the weather permits, you can simply take your cup of coffee over to one of the many park benches and enjoy it there, which is what we often do.

E Chocolotà’s

We’ve been here several times and it always orders the same drinks and food. The last few times, however, we’ve noticed that the rolls have less filling and the coffee tastes weaker. Maybe they’re trying to cut costs, but this will only lead to customers going elsewhere.

F Café Soloist

After a considerable search, we eventually found Café Soloist tucked away behind an organic grocery store. There was nothing outside to indicate that it was there, which would have been helpful! Once inside, we were presented with a menu that had more coffee options than we had ever seen before. Twenty minutes and a lot of discussion later, we finally decided what we wanted. We could then sit back and enjoy the happy chatter and welcoming atmosphere around us.

Frog Valley development

Creating a better area to meet the needs of the local community

The proposal to develop the part of our city known as Frog Valley has now been passed to the local council for consideration and approval. In case you missed earlier newspaper reports, here briefly are some of the changes and improvements that are being planned for the site.

An area of land in the south-east corner of Frog Valley has been allocated to the construction of a new primary school which, if building does go ahead, will accommodate 300 children. The size and location of the school mean that admission will not be limited to families who live in the area.

Another feature that will bring people together will be the new shopping mall. Plans are now to extend the existing local shops, which are currently located in small groups around the site, into one shopping zone, and this will see the addition of an organic farm shop and a vegan café.

A community centre will be central to the development of the site. It will provide a much-needed meeting place for clubs and societies that until now have had to meet wherever they can find space. The top of the centre will be a multi-gym with one swimming pool—something younger residents have been requesting for some time but has never been possible, due to cost.

For many years now, local businesspeople have been asking for better business premises, and this is a high priority for Frog Valley. Twenty thousand square meters of office space will be built, and this will cater for businesses of all sizes. In addition, an underground car park in the south-east area of the site will mean that office workers and visitors will no longer have to search for a parking space.

At our public consultation meeting, some residents asked if it would be possible to introduce services at the local health centre, including testing facilities within the centre itself, which would avoid the need for patients to travel to a neighbouring hospital for such a check. However, work is already underway to see a doctor at weekends and in the evenings, which is a welcome development.

Percil Training Institute

Welcome to the Percil Training Institute. We hope that you will enjoy your course of training with us. This information is provided to introduce our Institute and to let you know some of the important features of our professional training courses.

Courses

Percil Training Institute was established to provide high-quality short-duration training programmes for a range of professional needs. It has a highly trained and experienced teaching staff, many of whom have taught overseas.

Percil Training Institute provides courses in ten-week modules. Most courses (e.g. Office Management, Librarianship, Medical Records Organisation) consist of three modules, although some courses (Biotechnology, Computer Analysis) are three or four modules long. There is a break of two weeks between each module but since lectures or assignments are set for completion in these periods, it is not possible to take vacations during these breaks.

Since each course has varying needs, there are not necessarily any set hours for access across all programmes. You will need to consult the timetable for your course, which is provided at the commencement of your studies.

Please be reminded that Percil Training Institute cannot provide attendance or achievement certificates for students who miss instructional modules as a result of illness, an achievement certificate will only be issued.

Facilities

The opening times of the snack bar, coffee lounge, and restaurant are printed below your course timetable. No booking is required for any of the eating places except the restaurant, which serves full meals. However, students who wish to dine at the restaurant on a public holiday must book in advance. Reservations must be made for a party of 20 people in the group. A non-refundable deposit will be required for such a booking.

The Institute has a very fine sports complex. The swimming pool is open daily from 8.00 am to 8.00 pm and can be used free of charge by all Percil students who present a valid student enrolment card. The squash courts can be booked by any student with a valid student card and the hire cost is $4.50 per half hour. The gymnasium is available for a ten-week membership fee of $40.00, or $5.00 per visit, or an annual subscription of $100. Guests of Percil students are welcome to use the swimming pool but not the gymnasium areas.

Security

Please be careful that you do not leave valuable items in the classroom areas at any time. Percil Training Institute cannot be held responsible for any loss or damage to students’ property as a result of student negligence. After 8.30 pm the front doors of the Institute are locked. If you need to gain access to the Institute after this time, please contact the caretaker by pressing the doorbell and speaking through the intercom. If you are admitted by the caretaker you will be required to show your student card.

Medical Care

Minor accidents and injuries can usually be attended to on the premises in the Health Centre on the third floor. These services are free. Headache pills and other analgesics are available at standard pharmacy prices.

Divided opinions about letting farmland return to its natural state

Close to London’s Gatwick Airport is Knepp Castle Estate, owned by Charlie Burrell. It is an intensive 3,500-acre farm that has been ‘rewilded’, that is, allowed to return to its natural, uncultivated state. After barely a decade, nature has come back astonishingly quickly. Neat fields of maize have been replaced with a landscape that resembles the typical grasslands of Africa. The original narrow clipped hedges that edged the farmland are now eight metres wide, and deer race through ragwort, thistles and other weeds in the meadows. The estate boasts more of the unusual purple emperor butterflies than anywhere else in Britain. It’s also thought to be the only place where Britain’s fastest-declining birds, turtle doves, are multiplying. But as rewilding blossoms, so do controversies.

In Wales, one ecologist says the concept can’t even be mentioned to farmers. Even the harmless beaver is the subject of fierce debate: while it was recognised as a native animal in Scotland last year, beavers reintroduced in south-west England roam free only on a government trial. ‘For us it is strange to see the British struggling with the beaver. Come on, we have thousands of them!’ Dutch ecologist Leo Linnartz told a rewilding conference. Linnartz says that many Dutch objected to ‘nature development’ 30 years ago but rewilding principles are now mainstream.

In Britain, the rewilding movement started by writer and environmental activist George Monbiot is popularly seen to seek the return of large carnivores – bears, wolves and lynx. In practice, it is returning more modest herbivores like ponies and deer to the countryside.

For decades, ecologists believed the end result of allowing a landscape to run wild would be dense forest and a mass extinction of sun-loving wildflowers and butterflies. But this belief has been demolished by Dutch ecologist Frans Vera. Since the 1980s, Vera has introduced wild cattle, horses and deer to rewilded marshland, and proved that ‘natural’ grazing creates a more dynamic landscape, a constantly changing pattern of open glades and wooded groves.

In the Scottish Highlands, rewilding is taking a different form as large landowners restore ancient pine forest. But David Balharry, former Scotland director of Rewilding Britain, cautions that rewilding in Scotland will only be championed by policymakers and politicians when it is led by local communities.

For Burrell, rewilding has been a pragmatic way to revive the struggling family farm. Ecotourism there makes as much profit as his conventional farm did. Knepp’s unproductive soil meant Burrell could not compete with globalised food production. His profits may be steady while conventional dairy and cattle farm incomes fall dramatically, but no farmers have yet followed his example.

‘It takes a new eye to look at this and say, “that’s beautiful”, rather than go, “that’s just a real mess”,’ says Burrell. ‘Other farmers may have a moral attitude towards it too – “why are you stopping food production?”’ Many criticise rewilding for abandoning productive farmland when the world’s population is growing.

Wouter Helmer, director of Rewilding Europe, sees no conflict between food production and rewilding: Europe is heading for a future of food produced more intensively in fewer areas, releasing less productive land for rewilding, he says. ‘Farming is being done by fewer and fewer farmers on a larger scale on the best soils. They leave the less profitable lands to become adventure land for an increasingly urban population.

Helmer says there is no point in seeking to feed the world with traditional organic farming because there is no one to do the labour: when he asks Dutch students who wants to farm, none raise their hands. ‘They have a completely different relationship to nature to their parents or grandparents. They are not fighting with it on a daily basis. On one hand, they are disconnected from nature but on the other hand they are becoming more relaxed with nature – it’s hunting and gathering but hunting with a camera and gathering experiences. The part of the countryside which is not used for intensive farming starts to serve all these new urban needs.

Yet some environmentalists worry how rewilding connects with urban populations. ‘The challenge is how to make rewilding an issue that people in their ordinary lives can take action on,’ says Elaine Gilligan of Friends of the Earth. She thinks it is great for engaging people in nature but doubts whether it is seen as important in large urban areas like Birmingham.

Rewilders argue that reducing flood risks for cities is one practical way rewilding can enhance urban life. Ted Green, founder president of the Ancient Tree Forum, believes that intensive farming can worsen flash flooding, and cause fertile earth to be swept downriver and out to sea. ‘The land may belong to the landowner but the soil must belong to the nation,’ says Green. ‘When you see people cleaning out their houses after floods, you don’t see them removing water, you see them removing mud. It’s no longer an engineering problem – it’s a farming problem.

Some conservationists worry, however, that rewilding could replace the traditional protection of rare species on small nature reserves. ‘If rewilding really takes off, there’s a risk people will say, “Oh we don’t have to do any of that old stuff,”’ says Matt Shardlow, chief executive of Buglife. ‘But we still have habitat fragmentation and species in tiny places and we have to take care of them even if you have some areas made bigger for wildlife.’ Whatever happens, we need more projects like Knepp.

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