Big city life

„As a remedy to life in society

I would suggest the big city.
Nowadays, it is the only
desert within our means.”
Albert Camus

Ex. 1 Write the corresponding country next to each capital city.

City Country City Country
Vienna Helsinki
Brussels Paris
Prague Berlin
Tallinn Athens
Copenhagen Budapest
Vilnius Rome
Luxemberg Valletta
Warsaw Ljubljana
Lisbon Stockholm
Bratislava London
Bucharest Belfast
Bilbao Gdansk
Cardiff Nitra
Düsseldorf Poznan
Madrid Sofia
Dublin Amsterdam
Nicosia Riga

Ex. 2 Which of these words could be used to describe each picture.

modern small important

pedestrianised medium-sized international
industrial expensive regional
green eastern specialised
run-down western established
post-industrial northern global
big southern attractive

Ex. 3 What words can be used instead of saying the following:

very big very small very old very good

Ex. 3 Read the text and answer the questions below.
1. Which three ways of classifying a city are mentioned in paragraph one?
2. What factors did the European Union’s study of the state of Europe’s cities
concentrate on?
3. How many types of city did the study identify?
4. What is an international hub?
5. What is a specialised pole?
6. What is a regional pole?

Categorising Europe’s Cities

There are lots of different ways of classifying cities and lots of studies have been
done. Some studies concentrate on how big cities are, on economic factors like
how expensive a city is, others on how many artists or musicians work in the city.
There are hundreds of factors that can be studied.
Recently, the European Union commissioned a study to find out about the
present state of Europe’s cities. The study concentrated on the size of the cities’
populations as well as economic and financial factors. The researchers decided to
categorise Europe’s cities into three main types: International hubs, specialised
poles and regional poles.
• International hubs are big cities with an international reputation, like London or Barcelona.
• Specialised poles are big cities with an important role in the national economy, and
sometimes in the global economy, like Cardiff in the UK or Zaragoza in Spain.
• Regional poles are small to medium-sized cities that have an important place in their
region or province.

International hubs
Can you match the city types with the definitions?
1. established capitals
2. re-invented capitals
3. knowledge hubs

A B
Cities with an important Usually the national
role in the global economy capital, lots of
– important centres for organisations have their
international trade, headquarters in these
industry, business and cities. They are also the
finance. E.g. Lyon, centres of national
Stockholm. administration and public
services. E.g. Madrid,
Rome.
C
These cities are important
in their national economies
– as well as in the global
economy. Usually these
cities have moved on from
an industrial past to
modern economic
activities. They are often in
Eastern European
countries; the most recent
members of the European
Union. E.g. Prague,
Warsaw.
What are the benefits of trees to these things?
Benefits Why?

Children

Health

The economy

Climate change

Mental wellbeing

Infrastructure

Ex. 6 Put these words into the spaces in the paragraph below.
The city of Manchester in England has embarked on an (1) project
____________ plan to plant three million trees. The (2) ____________ existing
is called the "City of Trees". Project director, Tony Hothersall, explained ambitious
that the green venture had three main (3) ____________. He said: benefits
"One is to plant three million trees - a tree for every man, woman and focused
child - over the next 25 years. Next, we are very much (4) engage
____________ on bringing (5) ____________ woodland into aims
management because there is no point in planting new woodland if you manage
can't (6) ____________ what you've got already. Finally, we want to (7)
____________ people a lot more in their natural environment - in
planting trees, in managing areas, [and] in understanding more about
the (8) ____________ that trees and woodlands bring to our society."
Mr Hothersall further outlined the (9) ____________ behind the reduce
recently-launched environmental project. He said: "Manchester wants to fantastic
be a world-class city region. We have a lot of (10) ____________ resilient
development going on, but the natural environment needs to keep up rationale
with that." He believes the (11) ____________ will reconnect people terms
with trees and the natural world, provide benefits to health and (12) effect
____________ stress. He said: "Woodlands can do great things in (13) initiative
____________ of air pollution reduction and can help to (14) screen
____________ for noise pollution. They can also help cities and towns
become more (15) ____________ to climate change both in terms of
things like reducing the urban heat island (16) ____________ and also
reducing…flooding."