Guard Rails Reading Answers

Jul 1, 2025

Guard Rails Reading Answers is an academic reading answers topic. Guard Rails Reading Answers has a total of 13 IELTS questions in total. In the question set, you have to choose which paragraph contains the given statement. In the next set, you have to fill in the blank with the correct answer, only with one word.

The IELTS Reading section is an essential part of the test that evaluates a candidate's comprehension and analysis of various passage types. You will work through a number of IELTS reading practice problems in this section that resemble actual test situations. These questions are designed to help you improve your ability to recognise essential concepts, extract particular facts, and make inferences. Practising these IELTS reading problems can help you get comfortable with the structure and increase your confidence for the exam, regardless of whether you are studying for the Academic or General Training module.

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Section 1 GUARD RAILS

A.The way we travel around cities has a major impact on whether they are sustainable. Transportation is estimated to account for 30% of energy consumption in most of the world's most developed nations, so lowering the need for energy-using vehicles is essential for decreasing the environmental impact of mobility. But as more and more people move to cities, it is important to think about other kinds of sustainable travel too. The ways we travel affect our physical and mental health, our social lives, our access to work and culture, and the air we breathe. Engineers are tasked with changing how we travel around cities through urban design, but the engineering industry still works on the assumptions that led to the creation of the energy-consuming transport systems we have now: the emphasis placed solely on efficiency, speed, and quantitative data. We need radical changes, to make it healthier, more enjoyable, and less environmentally damaging to travel around cities.

B. Dance might hold some of the answers. That is not to suggest everyone should dance their way to work, however healthy and happy it might make us, but rather that the techniques used by choreographers to experiment with and design movement in dance could provide engineers with tools to stimulate new ideas in city-making. Richard Sennett, an influential urbanist and sociologist who has transformed ideas about the way cities are mode, argues that urban design has suffered from a separation between mind and body since the introduction of the architectural blueprint

C.Whereas medieval builders improvised and adapted construction through their intimate knowledge of materials and personal experience of the conditions on a site, building designs are now conceived and stored in media technologies that detach the designer from the physical

and social realities they are creating. While the design practices created by these new technologies are essential for managing the technical complexity of the modern city, they have the drawback of simplifying reality in the process.

D.To illustrate, Sennett discusses the Peachtree Center in Atlanta, USA, a development typical of the modernist approach to urban planning prevalent in the 1970s. Peachtree created a grid of streets and towers intended as a new pedestrian-friendly downtown for Atlanta. According

to Sennett, this failed because its designers had invested too much faith in computer-aided design to tell them how it would operate. They failed to take into account that purpose T-built street cafes could not operate in the hot sun without the protective awnings common in older

buildings, and would need energy consuming air conditioning instead, or that its giant cor park would feel so unwelcoming thot it would put people off getting out of their cars. What seems entirely predictable and controllable on screen has unexpected results when translated into reality.

E.The same is true in transport engineering, which uses models to predict and shape the way people move through the city. Again, these models are necessary, but they are built on specific world views in which certain forms of efficiency and safety are considered and other experiences of the city ignored. Designs that seem logical in models appear counter-intuitive in the actual experience of their users. The guard rails that will be familiar to anyone who has attempted to cross a British road, for example, were an engineering solution to pedestrian

safety based on models that prioritise the smooth flow of traffic. On wide major roads, they often guide pedestrians to specific crossing points and slow down their progress across the road by using staggered access points to divide the crossing into two — one for each carriageway. In

doing so they make crossings feel longer, introducing psychological barriers greatly impacting those that are the least mobile, and encouraging others to make dangerous crossings to get around the guard rails. These barriers don't just make it harder to cross the road: they divide

communities and decrease opportunities for healthy transport. As a result, many are now being removed, causing disruption, cost, and waste.

F.If their designers had had the tools to think with their bodies - like dancers - and imagine how these barriers would feel, there might have been a better solution. In order to bring about fundamental changes to the ways we use our cities, engineering will need to develop a richer

understanding of why people move in certain ways, and how this movement affects them. Choreography may not seem an obvious choice for tackling this problem. Yet it shares with engineering the aim of designing patterns of movement within limitations of space. It is an

art form developed almost entirely by trying out ideas with the body, and gaining instant feedback on how the results feel. Choreographers have deep understanding of the psychological, aesthetic, and physical implications of different ways of moving.

G.Observing the choreographer Wayne McGregor, cognitive scientist David Kirsh described how he 'thinks with the body’ Kirsh argues that by using the body to simulate outcomes, McGregor is able to imagine solutions that would not be possible using purely abstract

thought. This land of physical knowledge is valued in many areas of expertise, but currently has no place in formal engineering design processes. A suggested method for transport engineers is to improvise design solutions and get instant feedback about how they would work from their own experience of them, or model designs at full scale in the way choreographers experiment with groups of dancers. Above all, perhaps, they might learn to design for emotional as well as functional effects.

Questions 1-6

Reading Passage 1 has seven paragraphs, A-G. Which paragraph contains the following information?

1. reference to an appealing way of using dance that the writer is not proposing

Answer: B

Supporting statement: That is not to suggest everyone should dance their way to work, however healthy and happy it might make us

Keywords: dance, work

Keyword Location: Para B, Lines 1-2

Explanation: The paragraph makes the point that, even though it may seem healthy and joyful to encourage people to "dance" to work, it is not a good idea. However, the methods that choreographers employ to experiment and create movement in "dance" can give engineers the means to inspire fresh concepts for urban design.

2. an example of a contrast between past and present approaches to building

Answer: C

Supporting statement: Whereas medieval builders improvised and adapted construction through their intimate knowledge of materials and personal experience of the conditions on a site,

Keywords: construction, materials

Keyword Location: Para C, Lines 1-2

Explanation: According to the passage, modern building designs are imagined and stored in media technologies that connect the designer to the social and physical reality they are creating, whereas medieval builders improvised and applied construction through understanding with materials and firsthand knowledge of site conditions.

3. mention of an objective of both dance and engineering

Answer: F

Supporting statement: Yet it shares with engineering the aim of designing patterns of movement within limitations of space.

Keywords: engineering, space

Keyword Location: Para F, Line 6

Explanation: The passage suggests that the choreography is not specifically selected to address the issue. Still, it accomplishes the same goal as the technique used in engineering, which is to create movements that are within the limits of distance.

4. reference to an unforeseen problem arising from ignoring the climate

Answer: D

Supporting statement: street cafes could not operate in the hot sun without the protective awnings common in older buildings,

Keywords: sun, protective

Keyword Location: Para D, Line 6

Explanation: The Peachtree Center in Atlanta, USA, failed since its designers had placed too much trust in CAD technology to predict how it would function, according to the text. They neglected to consider that the sheltering awnings typical of older buildings were necessary for purpose-built street cafés to function in the scorching summer sun.

5. why some measures intended to help people are being reversed

Answer: E

Supporting statement: Designs that seem logical in models appear counter-intuitive in the actual experience of their users.

Keywords: counter-intuitive, experience

Keyword Location: Para E, Lines 4-5

Explanation: According to the text, the guard rails commonly found on British roads are now being removed as they have become a hindrance for everyone who wishes to cross the roads easily

6. reference to how transport has an impact on human lives

Answer: A

Supporting statement: The way we travel around cities has a major impact on whether they are sustainable.

Keywords: travel, sustainable

Keyword Location: Para A, Line 1

Explanation: Our social life, our access to jobs and culture, our physical and emotional health, and the air we breathe are all impacted by the methods we travel.

Questions 7-13

Choose ONE WORD ONLY for each answer.

Guard rails

Guard rails were introduced on British roads to improve the (7)…………. of pedestrians, while ensuring that the movement of (8).............. Is not disrupted. Pedestrians are led to access

points, and encouraged to cross one (9)...................at a time. An unintended effect is to create psychological difficulties in crossing the road, particularly for less (10)............... people.

Another result is that some people cross the road in a (11).................... way. The guard rails separate (12) ………………….and make it more difficult to introduce forms of transport

that are (13).................

(7)………….

Answer: SAFETY

Supporting statement: British road, for example, were an engineering solution to pedestrian

safety based on models that prioritise the smooth flow of traffic.

Keywords: pedestrian, safety

Keyword Location: Para E, Lines 6-7

Explanation: According to the text, guard rails on the British roads were a solution to the safety concern of the pedestrian.

(8)………….

Answer: TRAFFIC

Supporting statement: models that prioritise the smooth flow of traffic.

Keywords: prioritise, traffic

Keyword Location: Para E, Line 7

Explanation: The guard rails ensure a smooth flow of traffic for the people on the roads

(9)………….

Answer: CARRIAGEWAY

Supporting statement: using staggered access points to divide the crossing into two — one for each carriageway.

Keywords: staggered, carriageway

Keyword Location: Para E, Line 9

Explanation: According to the text, using staggered access points to divide the crossing into two—one for each carriageway—they frequently direct pedestrians to designated crossing sites on wide major roadways and slow down their passage over the road.

(10)………….

Answer: MOBILE

Supporting statement: greatly impacting those that are the least mobile,

Keywords: impacting, mobile

Keyword Location: Para E, Lines 10-11

Explanation: According to the text, the guard rails pose a psychological barrier to those who are the least mobile and physically incapable of crossing the road by using the guard rails.

(11)………….

Answer: DANGEROUS

Supporting statement: and encouraging others to make dangerous crossings to get around the guard rails.

Keywords: encouraging, dangerous

Keyword Location: Para E, Line 11

Explanation: According to the text, crossing around the guard rail is dangerous.

(12)………….

Answer: COMMUNITIES

Supporting statement: they divide communities and decrease opportunities for healthy transport.

Keywords: communities, opportunities

Keyword Location: Para E, Line 13

Explanation: According to the text, the guard rails divide communities and reduce chances for healthy transportation, in addition to making it more difficult to cross the street.

(13)............

Answer: HEALTHY

Supporting statement: decrease opportunities for healthy transport.

Keywords: decrease, healthy

Keyword Location: Para E, Line 13

Explanation: According to the text, the guard rails reduce the chances of healthy transportation for the people.

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