Urban traffic jams impose substantial financial and ecological burdens on city centers, yet conventional road-building solutions frequently encounter ...
GMAT Craft and Structure : (Structure) Questions
Urban traffic jams impose substantial financial and ecological burdens on city centers, yet conventional road-building solutions frequently encounter restrictions due to limited available space and financial constraints. Transportation specialist Sarah Chen and her research group have shown that intelligent traffic control systems utilizing real-time data analysis could _______ such restrictions through maximizing current roadway efficiency instead of demanding fresh infrastructure development.
Which choice completes the text with the most logical and precise word or phrase?
address
complicate
document
ignore
Step 1: Decode and Map the Passage
Part A: Create Passage Analysis Table
| Text from Passage | Analysis |
|---|---|
| 'Urban traffic jams impose substantial financial and ecological burdens on city centers,' |
|
| 'yet conventional road-building solutions frequently encounter restrictions due to limited available space and financial constraints.' |
|
| 'Transportation specialist Sarah Chen and her research group have shown that intelligent traffic control systems utilizing real-time data analysis could' |
|
| [MISSING WORD] |
|
| 'such restrictions through maximizing current roadway efficiency instead of demanding fresh infrastructure development.' |
|
Part B: Provide Passage Architecture & Core Elements
Main Point: Intelligent traffic control systems offer a way to work around the space and financial limitations that prevent traditional road-building solutions.
Argument Flow: The passage presents traffic jams as a costly problem, explains why the obvious solution (building roads) faces restrictions, then introduces research showing that smart systems could handle these restrictions by optimizing existing infrastructure rather than requiring new construction.
Step 2: Interpret the Question Precisely
This is a fill-in-the-blank question asking us to choose the best logical connector. The answer must create the right relationship between what comes before and after the blank.
Step 3: Prethink the Answer
- The word needs to describe what smart traffic systems could do to the 'restrictions due to limited available space and financial constraints.'
- The sentence explains that these systems work 'through maximizing current roadway efficiency instead of demanding fresh infrastructure development.'
- So we need a word that means the smart systems can handle, deal with, or solve these restrictions by working around them—using existing roads better rather than building new ones.
- The right answer should indicate that the smart systems can tackle or manage these limitations through an alternative approach.
address
- 'Address' means to deal with or tackle a problem.
- Fits perfectly—the smart systems can address (deal with) the space and money restrictions by finding a workaround solution.
- Matches our prethinking about handling the limitations through an alternative approach.
complicate
- 'Complicate' means to make more complex or difficult.
- Makes no sense—why would smart systems make the restrictions worse?
- Contradicts the positive tone of the research finding.
document
- 'Document' means to record or provide written evidence of something.
- Doesn't fit logically—the passage isn't about recording restrictions but about solving problems.
ignore
- 'Ignore' means to pay no attention to something.
- Doesn't work—you can't solve a problem by ignoring the restrictions that cause it.
- The sentence specifically explains how they work around the restrictions, showing they're not ignoring them.