2018年托福写作题库：如何提升社区环境

　　【题目】

　　What is the most useful action for people to help environment in their local communities?

　　1. Plant trees and create parks

　　2. Persuade local shops to stop providing plastic bags for consumers

　　3. Increase access to public transportation (such as buses and trains), and reduce the automobiles on roads

　　范文：

　　With the sense of community becoming much stronger, how to protect the environment of local communities has never failed to attract the attention of the general public. Therefore, when it comes to which is the most feasible measure to help environment, among planting trees and building parks, encouraging local shops to stop using plastic bags, and improving public transportation, people's notions may vary from one to another. Towards such a long-running tug-of-war, I am inclined to claim that the first option is the best.

　　Firstly, growing trees and constructing parks can definitely help to ameliorate the environment. For one thing, more trees will contribute to the improvement of the air quality of the whole neighborhood. As is common sense, the prosperous industrial development has produced large amounts of waste gas, with the result that the haze and smoggy weather shroud quite frequently the major cities in our country. The current air condition necessitates the planting of trees, which can purify the contaminated air to a large extent. In other words, trees, the lung of the earth, play a vital role in absorbing some harmful gas and producing more fresh air through photosynthesis. For another, the public parks can be helpful to increase the biodiversity of the local community. Accompanying the rapid urbanization, an increasing number of natural lands have been utilized for constructing factories, shopping mall and skyscrapers, which greatly diminishes the natural habitats of animals, such as birds and squirrels. In this case, parks become the only place which can serve as habitats for those animals. Accordingly, the species of animals living here can become more diverse.

　　In addition, there are certain limitations for the other two options. Admittedly, reducing the use of plastic bags and making public transportation more accessible may also be conducive to the environmental protection in some degrees. To illustrate, if the plastic bags are prohibited, the so-called white pollution will be relieved. Also, easier access to public transportation means less use of private cars, which leads to the reduction of car exhaust. However, in comparison to planting trees and building parks, the above two measures enjoy less popularity among the residents of the community and thus are unlikely to be implemented. The underlying reason is that growing trees and constructing parks can create a more comfortable living environment while the other two choices can bring about more inconvenience. To be more specific, if shops stop the use of plastic shopping bags, the customers have to take a cloth bag while shopping. Also, taking public transportation will take longer time than driving the private cars, which means that commuters have to get up much earlier than before. It is self-evident that whether a policy can be carried out directly determines its effect, which is especially true of the above situation.

　　Taking what has been discussed above, we can draw the conclusion that the most effective way of protecting environment in local communities is to plant trees and create parks.