The Millennium Bridge 千禧橋
收聽與下載
The script of this programme 本節目臺詞
John: June 2000, and London saw the opening of its first pedestrian-only bridge, the Millennium Bridge, between St Paul's Cathedral and the Tate Modern art gallery.
It was quite a day and within minutes hundreds of people had come to see the new bridge and to walk across it.
Oliver: I'm Oliver.
John: And I'm John, and in this edition of On the Town, we're investigating the Millennium Bridge.
Oliver: 千禧橋。
John: It was designed by the architect Lord Norman Foster, and has a very sleek, silvery appearance.
The Millennium Bridge
Oliver: 橋梁的設計者是一名建筑師 an architect. 銀色的橋梁呈現出圓滑的造型。 A sleek and silvery appearance.
John: It has a very modern look, and it's also a suspension bridge.
Oliver: 吊橋 a suspension bridge.
Oliver: Now, I hear that there was a problem when the bridge opened to the public in 2000.
John: There was, yes. A big problem!
Oliver: What was it?
John: The bridge wobbled!
Oliver: It wobbled, 橋是晃動的!
John: The day the bridge opened, hundreds of people walked across it and it started to sway in a disconcerting way! It took two years for the bridge to be secured and made rigid.
Oliver: 工程師們不得不給橋梁重新加固 rigid. 兩年之后，千禧橋才得以再次向公眾開放。接下來我們會聽到橋梁設計者、建筑師 Norman Foster 接受BBC采訪時的錄音。
John: Did the architect find it frustrating that the bridge had to be closed for two years?
Challenging I would say, but of course, if you measure the life of this structure in hundreds of years, it will be around as long as it has a useful life. It's not made of materials which are going to corrode, so if you measure that period that we’re talking about in the wider perspective, it's a blip. A pretty harrowing blip, but a blip.
Lord Norman Foster
John: Lord Norman Foster said it was challenging to have to keep the bridge closed for two years of repairs.
Oliver: 是具有挑戰性的 challenging.
John: He said the bridge is not made of materials that are going to corrode.
Oliver: 千禧橋不會被腐蝕 to corrode.
John: So the length of closure is only a blip in the life of the bridge. A blip is a very short period of time.
Oliver: 建筑師說對于將長時間存在的千禧橋來講，關閉整修的兩年是非常短的，僅僅是一個微不足道的小點兒 a blip.
John: Now that the bridge has been made rigid, what do the pedestrians who walk across it think of it?
Man: It's like a carnival, everybody is just talking about the bridge, and the construction and the wind. We’ve not had a wobble yet, it doesn’t feel like jelly.
Girl: It doesn’t wobble anymore.
Older Woman: Well, I'm a bridge freak, and having not seen it before I came down especially to see it, and walking over, I thought it was rather beautiful to look at. It’s a bicycle-friendly, pedestrian-friendly bridge. There is, I'm afraid, in the wind, a slight vibration. But as somebody pointed out to me, if there weren’t a vibration at all we’d have to worry. Walking over it, it looks rather beautiful.
French Man: Well it's absolutely terrific. It’s my last day in London. I've been here in May last year, when it couldn't open, and I couldn't cross it. And today's the last day. Look at that!
Visitors at the Millennium Bridge
John: So now people seem to like the Millennium Bridge. One woman said she was a bridge freak.
Oliver: 那位年紀大的女性說她自己是一個橋梁迷，a bridge freak 意思是說她是一個橋梁愛好者。
John: She said it was bicycle and pedestrian friendly.
Oliver: 方便步行和騎自行車。
John: She felt some light vibration when she was walking on the bridge.
Oliver: 輕微振動 light vibration.
John: But with a suspension bridge there has to be some movement.
Oliver: But not so much that it wobbles!
John: Exactly. Well, we’ll be talking to you about more interesting places in the UK in the next On the Town, so listen out for that.
Oliver: 記住，你可以登陸我們的網頁，了解更多信息網址是 www.bbcchina.com.cn, 然后，點擊 Learning English.
John: See you next time.
Oliver: Bye.
