A cost-effective solution to the problem of airport congestion and the

Would you please explain why you consider C to be out of scope ?

simply because we care about the stretch between 300 and 800 km not over.

Re-reading the option choice "The majority of passengers departing from rural airports are flying to destinations in cities over 800 kilometers away" tells me that it talks about 'the majority of passengers departing from rural airports' which may form a very small percentage of overall passenger traffic incoming at the city airport. That'd invalidate this option, but definitely not the reason " we care about the stretch between 300 and 800 km not over".

Any other thoughts anybody ?

Could you please explain why is D wrong

conclusion:
trains ==>this will reduce congestion ,reduce pollution...and they are also profitable.
now we have to weaken this conclusion.

option D says:
Many new airports are being built in areas that are not yet served by high-speed train service.
it is just stating fact ..that airports are in construction this has no effect on conlusion...

hope it helps.

no this is not true.

option C is wrong because it is just talking about rural airports.....hence that option is not considering the full scenarios.(excluding airports from urban areas)

not able to understand why B is correct. It say that pollution per passenger is more for trains. So the argument assumes that number of passenger travelling in the train is more that that of plane. While generally this may be true, it may not be always true.

eg if there are 100 person travelling by train and 300 by airplane, then pollution by train may be less than plane. what am i missing here?

buyt here you are assuming a sort of information that you bring from the outside, from the real world.

You must weaken the argument according to the info IN the argument: the question if we have more passengers who use trains more than planes is not our concern in this precise moment.

hope this help

Also 'rural' is a key word, that is not mentioned anywhere in stimulus. One fake move (or word on this case) and you're done

But still between B and C it is a close call. I personally like B better, but that's just me.

Tricky one.

The answer rely on the rural word, in order to see that answer B is good over C.

Why answer C is wrong: Imagine there are 100 people travelling. Perhaps only 1 is traveling through a rural airport! Therefore, 99 travel through a non-rural airport and perhaps they are travelling between 300 and 800 km!

The answer is therefore B.

B States that high speed trains would cause more pollution per passenger than airplanes however, we do not know the no of passengers in airplanes vs in trains so we can't conclude which one does more overall pollution (if total passengers is lesser in trains and pollution per passenger is little more in trains then overall contribution to pollution might still be lower in case of trains than planes)

The author is assuming that most airplane passengers travel between 300 to 800 Kms hence, creating train service between 300 to 800 might decrease the pollution done by planes. Any option that undermines this assumption weakens the conclusion. C is doing so.

The most important word is option C is the Adjective" rural" and this makes this choice out of scope as the passage is talking about Major cities ( urban not the rural ones)

A cost-effective solution to the problem of airport congestion and the pollution it causes is to provide high-speed train service between major cities in China, lying 300 to 800 kilometers apart. This plan would cost far less than the expansion of existing airports and would reduce the number of airplanes clogging airports and polluting the air.

Which of the following, if true, could opponents of the plan most appropriately cite as a piece of evidence for their objection to the plan?

In order to maintain current levels of airport congestion, significant repairs of airports must be undertaken.

Wrong : Seems out of Scope.No mention about the pollution that is caused or the congestion.

The high-speed trains that would be used as part of such plan cause more pollution per passenger than do planes.
Correct: This directly addresses as to why the plan would be opposed on the grounds that the pollution would increase.

The majority of passengers departing from rural airports are flying to destinations in cities over 800 kilometers away.
Wrong: Please notice carefully.This talks about the majority of passengers from Rural airports not all airports.Thus lets say if we have 1000 urban airports and 100 rural airports then the argument would still hold true.

Many new airports are being built in areas that are not yet served by high-speed train service.
Wrong: Out of scope.

A large proportion of air passengers in China take short-distance flights.
Wrong : Out of scope

I fell for C, and now I see why it is incorrect, yet I disagree with B, at least partially.

the argument says that to reduce congestion and the pollution, a train is needed. what if the people who travel from airports are not travelling between major cities in China?
I say that a more valid option such as: providing information that would prove that the congestion would continue is more appropriate.

Boil it down -New plan of high-speed train service would cost far less than the expansion of existing airports and reduce the number of airplanes clogging and pollution
Type- Weaken

B. The high-speed trains that would be used as part of such plan cause more pollution per passenger than do planes. Correct
C.The majority of passengers departing from rural airports are flying to destinations in cities over 800 kilometers away. - Incorrect -over 800 km is out of scope. Also we don't know rural airports constitute what percentage of total airports.

I don't think B fits the bill!!

Reason: Only if the number of passengers are assumed to be equal for the plane and train, B could work.
Otherwise,
Let's assume for the trains the Pollution/Passenger is 20.
Similarly for the planes it's 10.
If the number of passengers for trains are 50, then total pollution level is 1000.
And if the number of passengers for planes are 200, the pollution level is 2000.

So planes could not be effective, even though pollution/passenger of train is higher than the plane.

Correct me if I am wrong.

Hi Visage2c ,
We need to weaken the argument that the construction of high-speed train service is a better plan than airport expansion.
Now as per your example , the total pollution caused by trains for 50 passengers is 1000 . But if airport expansion occurs and these passengers use airplanes instead of high-speed train then the total pollution caused by these 50 people would drop to 500 .
So that indeed weakens the plan.

Hope this helps!!