PrepTest 134, Section 1, Question 18
Traffic engineers have increased the capacity of the(60 more words not shown)
Which one of the following(8 more words not shown)
- AThe city's financial(16 more words not shown)
- BThe city's financial(15 more words not shown)
- COn an average(14 more words not shown)
- DTraffic flow across(27 more words not shown)
- EThe city's mayor(25 more words not shown)
Reading the argument
The bridge improvement mattered to the city's finances. We don't need to know exactly how it helped to follow the connections the passage gives us.
First, the increased rush-hour flow depended on the city's investment in computer modeling. Without that investment, the increase wouldn't have happened. Second, resolving the city's financial predicament depended on the increased traffic flow. Without that increase, the financial problem wouldn't have been resolved.
What we’re looking for
So the bridge improvement was essential to that resolution. That is the sort of claim I'd expect when we're asked what follows. Keep the dependencies straight as we read the choices: something can be required for a result without being sufficient to produce the whole result by itself. The mayor's request and the modeling investment are also in the story, but we shouldn't add details about their importance or motivation that the passage never provides.
Working the answers
- A
The passage requires an investment in computer modeling technology, not this particular software package. A competing package might have served the same purpose. Think of using one supplier's software rather than another's: needing modeling doesn't establish that only the product actually chosen could work.
- BCorrect
This follows the chain one step farther back than my initial focus on the bridge. Without the modeling investment, the rush-hour increase would not have occurred. Without that increase, the financial predicament would not have been resolved. So without the modeling investment, the financial resolution would not have happened.
Each link is a stated requirement. We aren't claiming that buying modeling technology alone guarantees financial success, or that nothing else mattered. We are identifying an investment that the passage makes necessary to this outcome.
- C
Rush-hour traffic increased; total daily traffic needn't have increased. More vehicles could now cross during rush hour while fewer cross at other times. A change in when the traffic occurs doesn't, by itself, establish more vehicles over an average full day.
- D
The mayor requested the investment. That doesn't make it the highest budgetary priority. The city could consider several projects more important and still fund this one. D adds a ranking of priorities and makes that ranking necessary, neither of which the passage establishes.
- E
A beneficial result doesn't reveal the mayor's motive. The mayor might have wanted to improve rush-hour traffic, but might also have requested the technology for a different reason. We know the request was made and the investment mattered; we aren't told why the mayor supported it.
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