阅读理解 Central Park, emerging from a period of abuse and neglect, remains one of the most popular attractions in New York City, with half a million out-of-towners among the more than 3 million people who visit the park yearly. About 15 million individual visits are made each year.
Summer is the season for softball, concerts, and Shakespeare; fall is stunning; winter is wonderful for sledding, skating, and skiing; and spring-time is the loveliest of all. It was all planned that way.
About 130 years ago Frederic Law Olmsted and his collaborator Calvert Vaux submitted their landscaping plan for rectangular parcel two miles north of the town's center. The barren swampy tract, home for squatters and a bone-boiling works that made glue, was reported as "a pestilential spot where miasmic odors taint every breath of air". It took 16 years for workers with pickaxes and shovels to move 5 million cubic feet of earth and rock, and to plant half a million trees and shrubs , making a tribute to nature—a romantic nineteenth-century perception of nature.
What exists today is essentially Olmsted and Vaux's plan, with more trees, buildings, and asphalt. Landscape architects still speak reverently of Olmsted's genius and foresight, and the sensitive visitor can see the effects he sought.
单选题 With what subject is the passage mainly concerned?
【正确答案】 D
【答案解析】本文主要记述了中央公园的设计、建造和发展过程，D符合题意为正确答案。A是Olmsted和Vaux的生平；B是纽约市的旅游业；C是纽约市十九世纪艺术的典范。
单选题 According to the passage, which is the prettiest time of year in Central Park?
【正确答案】 B
【答案解析】从文章第二段：“…and spring time is the loveliest of all”可知，春天是中央公园一年中最美好的时候。故选B。
单选题 It can be inferred that the "rectangular parcel" mentioned in Para. 3 is________.
【正确答案】 A
【答案解析】第三段首句：“…submitted their landscaping plan for rectangular parcel two miles north of the town’s center”司知，rectangular parcel位于市中心以北两英里处，这里是他们设计建造中央公园的地点。因此说rectangular parcel就是中央公园的位置所在。因此正确答案为A。
单选题 According to the passage, before Olmsted and Vaux began their work, the area now occupied by Central Park was________.
【正确答案】 B
【答案解析】根据第三段中：“The barren swampy tract…as‘a pestilential spot where miasmic odors taint every breath of air’”可知，这是一片荒凉潮湿的地带，一些人在那里擅自搭建房屋，还有一家用动物骨头熬制胶水的工厂。据当时的报道，那片区域是一个瘟疫肆虐、空气腐臭的地带。因此可以判断，那里以前是一个贫瘠、潮湿而又肮脏的地方。故选B。
单选题 It can be inferred from the passage that today's landscape architects praise Olmsted for his_.
【正确答案】 D
【答案解析】从文章最后一段中：“Landscape architects still speak reverently of Olmsted’s genius and foresight”可知，环境美化专家们至今还满怀敬意地谈起Olmsted的天才和预见能力，现在的纽约已不是130年前的纽约了，而中央公园历经百年直到今日还吸引着大批的游客。这说明Olmsted对纽约的未来发展有着极为准确而深远的预见性。故选D。