Letter to the editor: Hands off Main Street: stretch · Grade 10

The passage and its 8 questions

Directions: Read the passage carefully. Then answer the questions in full sentences.

• To the editor: I have lived in this town for thirty-one years, and I have never read a worse idea than the council's plan to close Main Street to cars on weekends. The plan's supporters are mostly students and people with too much free time on their hands, so it is hardly surprising that they have not thought it through.
• Let us be honest about where this leads. First it will be weekends. Then it will be every evening, then every day, and before long we will need a permit to drive to our own homes. Main Street has carried cars since my grandfather's time. If it was good enough for him, it is good enough for us.
• Supporters claim that a car-free street would bring more shoppers. I have news for them. My cousin's town tried something similar, and within a year her favorite bakery had closed. Need I say more? The choice before us is simple: either we keep Main Street open to traffic, or we watch it become a ghost town.
• Everyone I have spoken to agrees with me. At the barbershop last Saturday, not one person supported the plan. The council should listen to the real residents of this town, not a noisy group with signs and slogans.
• Councilor Adeyemi, who proposed this scheme, has said a great deal about cleaner air.
• Perhaps she should explain why she drives her own car to every council meeting before she lectures the rest of us. Until she gives up her car, she has no business asking us to give up our street.
• The plan's backers say they simply want people to enjoy the street. What they really want is to punish anyone who drives. And while the council wastes time on this fantasy, the potholes on Elm Avenue grow deeper every week. Why is no one talking about that?
• There is one more point. Several older residents, including my neighbor, who uses a wheelchair, rely on parking directly outside the pharmacy. The plan says nothing about how they will reach it. Until the council answers that question, it should not close a single block. Sincerely, a lifelong resident.
• 1. What is the letter writer's main claim?
• 2. Name the fallacy in paragraph 2's chain from 'weekends' to 'a permit to drive to our own homes,' and explain why the reasoning fails.
• 3. Paragraph 3 contains at least two fallacies. Identify them.
• 4. What does the phrase 'a noisy group with signs and slogans' suggest about the plan's supporters, and why is it unfair?
• 5. How do the councilor's driving habits and the potholes on Elm Avenue function in the argument? Name the fallacy each one represents.
• 6. Copy the sentence that raises the letter's one legitimate concern, and explain why it is stronger than the rest of the argument.
• 7. Find a word in the passage that was new or tricky for you. What do you think it means? Which words around it helped you?
• 8. Analyze how the author structures the passage to build an argument or explanation.