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  3. Rick Snyder, the governor of Michigan, thinks of himself as a can-do kind of

Rick Snyder, the governor of Michigan, thinks of himself as a can-do kind of

游客2023-12-13  29
问题     Rick Snyder, the governor of Michigan, thinks of himself as a can-do kind of guy. He was a successful businessman, overseeing exponential growth at Gateway, a computer company, in the 1990s. In his subsequent career as a venture capitalist, he made enough dosh to donate more than $ lm to charity, with a few million left over to jump-start his 2010 campaign for governor. His first state budget was ambitious: it eliminated most tax credits, created a flat 6% business tax and allocated hundreds of millions to rebuild the state’s crumbling infrastructure, all while remaining in balance. But he has met his match in Manuel "Matty" Moroun, who is winning a battle with Mr. Snyder over the governor’s support for a second international bridge linking Detroit, Michigan, with Windsor, Ontario.
    Mr. Moroun has a very good reason for opposing the construction of a new bridge at the busiest commercial crossing between Canada and the United States: He owns the existing Ambassador Bridge, built in 1929, and a publicly owned competitor would eat away at his toll revenues. There are even older tunnels connecting the two cities, but the bridge is the preferred crossing for lorries, and currently handles more than a quarter of the $ 680 billion a year in trade between the United States and Canada. Mr. Moroun has grown quite wealthy thanks to the bridge, which he has owned through the Detroit International Bridge Company since 1979.
    Mr. Moroun concedes that congestion at peak travel times is a problem, and that his own structure should be closed for repairs. The Canadian, American, Michigan and Ontario governments all want to build a new $2.2 billion crossing three km (two miles) downriver, which would be publicly owned but privately operated. The Canadian government is keen enough that it has offered Michigan almost $ 550m, to be repaid from bridge tolls, to cover its costs. The rest of the financing is to be raised from the two federal governments and from bonds issued by a bridge authority.
    In contrast, Mr. Moroun’s preferred solution is building a second span alongside the existing one, which he would finance and own himself. He argues that the traffic predictions used for the government-backed bridge are hopelessly optimistic, given that current cross-border flows—which totalled 7.2m last year- are still far below the pre-2001 peak of 12.4m. (One possible explanation for this decline is that lorry drivers have started taking detours to less convenient routes to avoid being stuck in traffic on the bridge.) Michigan residents will end up paying higher taxes, he says, despite promises to the contrary. He also notes that his proposed span would cost significantly less than an entirely new bridge (about $ 500m) because it would use the same approach roads and customs facilities as the Ambassador Bridge, and would be paid for by his company. Such a design would, of course, do nothing to reduce lorry traffic in central Windsor -one of the main reasons Canada wants a new bridge.
    A decade in the planning, the bridge cannot go ahead without Michigan’s approval, which Mr. Snyder has not been able to get through its legislature. Detroit International Bridge Company has financed a $ 4.7m advertising campaign to sour public opinion on the deal. His political contributions have helped swing senatorial votes. So far his strategy has worked: in late October a state Senate committee refused to approve the legislation. The lawmakers who opposed the bill said its language did not adequately protect the neighbourhood where the Detroit side of the bridge will be located.
    Mr. Snyder is still putting up a fight. In Ottawa, where he was addressing a conference and consulting with the Canadian government, he predicted on November 2nd that a breakthrough would be reached "in a matter of months, not years". Although he did not divulge any details, he says that buying out Mr. Moroun had been discussed and dismissed in the past, and that he was not at the point of considering using an executive order to grant the approval. "Our primary path, " he says, "is talking to legislators." A new bridge would make plenty of business sense, and is supported by all of the big companies in the area, including the Detroit automakers with facilities on both sides of the border. But Mr. Snyder will have to persuade Michigan’s lawmakers that it makes political sense as well. [br] The best title for the passage is probably
选项 A、Legislation over a New Bridge.
B、Rick Snyder and Manuel Moroun’s Battle.
C、What Is behind a New Bridge?
D、Canadian-American Border: A Bridge Too Far?
答案 D
解析 主旨题。本文开篇由密歇根州州长Rick Snyder的州财政预算方案，引出修建第二座横跨美加的桥梁这一问题。接着介绍Snyder的竞争对手Moroun反对修建新桥的理由。之后介绍政府想要修建新桥的原因及方案，以及Moroun自己提出的解决方案。最后两段分别介绍Moroun的支持者反对修建新桥而采取的措施，以及Snyder为了能够修建新桥而做出的努力，但作者只是客观描述和分析，并未对结果进行预测，因此可以看出本文主题就是美加之间的这座国际新桥，而是否能够修建还未有定论，故[D]符合文意。
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