In spite of the wealth of examples of urban architecture in older cities，both in Europe and in the United States，solutions to current problems of the physical decay of cities in the United States have come slowly．The first reaction after the war was to bulldoze and build bright new towers and efficient roadways，but these solutions did not respond to people．By the close of the 1960's it became more common to deal gently with the existing urban fabric and to insert new buildings in such a way as to complement the physical and social environment；in other cases valued buildings have been rehabilitated and returned to economic productivity．A particularly striking example is the rehabilitation of Ghirardelli Square，San Francisco．This hillside melange of nineteenth-century commercial buildings，clustered around a chocolate plant， was purchased in 1962 by William Roth to forestall wholesale development of the waterfront as a district of high-rent apartment towers．Nearly all of the nineteenth-century buildings were retained and refurbished，and fountains have been set up，which offer varied prospects of San Francisco Bay．Perhaps most telling is the preservation of the huge Ghirardelli sign as an important landmark；it is such improbable，irrational，and cherished idiosyncrasies which give cities identity and character．
1．The author's main purpose in the passage is to describe ________．
A）the differences between urban architecture in Europe and in the United States
B）the most striking features of San Francisco's scenic waterfront district
C）nineteenth-century buildings in twentieth-century cities
D）characteristics of recent solutions to urban architectural problems in the United States
2．According to the passage，after the war many of the attempts of urban architects failed because __________．
A）buildings were not built quickly enough
B）new roads required too much space
C）the needs of the urban residents were overlooked
D）the towering buildings were too tall
3．The author discusses Ghirardelli Square in order to illustrate which of the following procedures？
A）The construction of new buildings to conceal older structures
B）The selective removal of old buildings to create peace for residential units
C）The restoration of old buildings to make them commercially useful
D）The demolition of apartment towers to make way for more attractive construction
4．According to the passage，the Ghirardelli sign was preserved because it_______．
A）was designed and built by a famous artist
B）is included in an advertising contract with the Ghirardelli Chocolate Company
C）is suitable as vantage point from which to view San Francisco Bay
D）has long-standing importance as a symbol in the community
5．The sentence in line 11would best keep its meaning if“most telling”was replaced by ________．
A）most significant B）in GREatest demand
C）most debatable D）the best publicized
6．Put the underlined sentence in the passage into Chinese．
参考答案：DCCDA
翻译：尽管在欧洲和美国的一些年代较久的城市有许多城市建筑的范例，但是当前美国一些城市建筑的自然衰败问题却解决得很缓慢。
