Answer Questions 1 through 3 based solely on the following map. You are required to follow traffic laws and the flow of traffic. A single arrow depicts one-way streets and two arrows pointing in opposite directions represent two-way streets. N S E W one way two way
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RIVER ROAD P ARKER R O AD McARTHUR BOULEVARD CHURCH STREET WASHINGTON ROAD LINCOLN AVENUE MAIN STREETASH ROAD ASH ROAD
FIRST STREET SECOND STREET THIRD STREET FOUR TH STREET FIRST ST . CHURCH STREET APTS. CITY HALL TOWN SQUARE –SPATIAL CONCEPTS–
1. Officer Harolds is sitting at a red light at the inter- section of Fourth Street and Washington Road facing southbound. The dispatcher sends him on a one-vehicle collision call. A motorist has run into the northwest corner of the City Hall build- ing. What is the quickest route for Officer Harolds to take to get to City Hall?
a. Turn west onto Washington Road, then south on Third Street, and then west on Main Street to Parker Road.
b. Turn west onto Washington Road, then south onto Parker Road, and then east to Lincoln Avenue.
c. Turn west onto Washington Road, south on Second Street, and then east onto Main Street to Parker Road.
d. Turn west onto Washington Road, then south onto Parker Road, and then east onto Main Street.
Strategies for Map Reading
The situation tells you that Officer Harolds needs to answer a collision call. The dispatcher tells you the spe- cific location, the northwest corner of City Hall. As you can see by the map, the City Hall building can be approached on four sides by four different streets. Since you’d like to be close to the northwest corner of the building, you should be considering a route that will put you on that side of City Hall.
Your first step will be to study the map and pick out the quickest legal route to the collision. The arrows show you that Washington Road is a one-way street. Since Officer Harolds is facing south on Fourth Street at Washington Road, his only option available is to turn west onto Washington Road. Notice that Washington Road runs parallel to Lincoln Avenue, the street where City Hall is located. Also notice that Lincoln Avenue runs to the east and you want to end up on the north-
west corner of the building. Now look at City Hall. The northwest corner of this building is at the intersection of Parker Road and Lincoln Avenue. (To determine the northwest corner of the building, it may be a helpful trick to imagine that the north-south-east-west indi- cator is written in the middle of the word “City Hall.” That makes it easy to see where the northwest corner would be for the building.) The quickest, easiest route appears to be west on Washington Road, south on Parker Road and east on Lincoln Avenue. You have your route, so now it’s time to see if one of the multiple- choice options matches the route you determined.
When you first glance at the four options, it’s fairly obvious that they all start with a west turn onto Wash- ington Road. Starting with option a, we see that this option lists turning south onto Third Street and then west on Main Street. Main Street is one block south of the street you’d like to be on, so this option is not the most efficient route. Eliminate this option and go on to option b.
In option b, you see that the first turn after head- ing west on Washington Road is to turn south onto Parker Road, then east to Lincoln Avenue, which will put the officer at the scene of the collision. This option matches the route you figured out before reading the answers, so b is more than likely the right choice.
However, it’s always best to continue reading the answers to make sure you don’t pass up an option that turns out to be better than the one you originally fig- ured. Option c has Officer Harolds turning east on Main Street, which is heading away from the call and does not end up at Parker Road. Option d is not the best answer because the corner of Parker Road and Main Street is one block too far to the south. The only reason you’d choose either of these options would be not knowing which was the northwest corner of City Hall.
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Remember, even when you feel like you already have the right answer, it is best to examine all the answer choices to be on the safe side.
Finding the Direction
Question 2 is based on the same map as Question 1, but it is different. The test maker wants to know if you can figure out which direction you are facing.
2. Officer Watson is driving eastbound on Main Street at Fourth Street. If he makes a U-turn on Main Street, turns onto Third Street and then makes another U-turn, what direction will he be facing?
a. east b. west c. north d. south
Strategies for Direction Questions
The best strategy for solving this type of question is the same as Question 1. Trace your path after reading the question, then look through the answers until you find the one that matches your decision. Obviously, you don’t have much reading to do to pick out the right answer. You’ll mainly be looking to see which letter is in front of the answer you want.
In Question 2, the answer you want is d. When you traced your path on the map, you should have seen that if Officer Watson is heading east on Main Street and he makes a U-turn, he will be heading west. If he turns onto Third Street, the only way he can turn will be north on Third Street. If he makes a second U-turn, he will now be facing south.