保持社交距离

第一段

Office working and social distancing really do not mix . The reason why offices exist is to bring colleagues together so they can collaborate. So when employees start to return as pandemic-related restrictions are lifted , they will face a host of challenges.

重点词汇

• collaborate（與…一起工作,）

  • to work with someone else for a special purpose

    • Two writers collaborated on the script for the film.
    • A German company collaborated with a Swiss firm to develop the product.
    • The British and Italian police collaborated in catching the terrorists.

• a host of(大量的）

  • A very large number or collection of people or things

    • We had a whole host of problems on opening night
    • They cared for wounded soldiers and performed a host of other duties

第二段

Start with the basics: getting into the building . In most offices a lot of people tend to leave and arrive at the same time. Keeping them six feet(two metres) apart as they enter may require a queue in the street . Many workers will want to avoid public transport until the pandemic fades from memory , so may cycle to work. But even where offices have changing rooms , they tend to be fairly cramped ; hard to keep employees apart.

重点词汇

• queue（人或車排成的）隊）

  • a line of people, usually standing or in cars, waiting for something:

    • Are you in the queue for tickets?
    • There was a long queue of traffic stretching down the road.
    • If you want tickets you'll have to join the queue.
    • It makes me mad when someone jumps the queue (= goes straight to the front).

• transport(货物／人, 运输)

  • the movement of people or goods from one place to another:

    • the transport of live animals
    • The company will arrange transport from the airport.

• fade（（使）褪色, （使）變暗）

  • to (cause to) lose colour, brightness, or strength gradually:

    • If you hang your clothes out in the bright sun, they will fade
    • My suntan is already fading.
    • The sun had faded the blue walls.

• cramped(狹小的, 狹窄的)

  • not having enough space or time:

    • a cramped room/house
    • We have six desks in this room, so we're a little cramped
    • I have a very cramped schedule.

第三段

lifts are an even bigger choke-point . In normal circumstances people who work in high-rises are accustomed to a long wait to reach the top floors . If lifts can only carry two or three people at a time, that wait would lengthen . And imagine the hassle if a group of visitors arrives at once.

重点词汇

• circumstances(條件，情況)

  • a fact or event that makes a situation the way it is:

    • I think she coped very well under the circumstances.
    • Obviously we can't deal with the problem until we know all the circumstances.
    • She died in suspicious circumstances.

• accustom

  • to make someone familiar with new conditions:

    • It takes awhile to accustom yourself to working at night.

• hassle(麻煩，困難)

  • (a situation causing) difficulty or trouble:

    • I can't face the hassle of moving again.
    • My boss has been giving me a lot of hassle this week.
    • It's one of the few bars that women can go to and not get any hassle from men.

第四段

When workers make it to their desks, there is another problem . In recent years offices have been increasing density . The space per workstation in Britain decreased by around a quarter in the decade to 2018, according to Jon Neale of JLL, a property consultancy . But social-distancing rules may drastically reduce the number of people offices can accommodate. Nick Jackson of Arup, an engineering and architectural group says a two-metre space between desks in a central London office building may reduce the number of staff it can host to 30%-35% of the pre-pandemic total.

重点词汇

• density(密集, （人口等的）密度)

  • the number of people or things in a place when compared with the size of the place:

    • The area has a high/low population density.
    • We were unable to move because of the density of the crowd.

• consultancy（諮詢公司）

  • a company that gives advice on a particular subject:

    • a management/financial/recruitment consultancy

• drastically

  • in a way that is severe and sudden or has very noticeable effects:

    • Their budget has been drastically reduced.
    • Our communication environment has changed drastically in the last 10 years.

• accommodate（為…找個地方）

  • to provide with a place to live or to be stored in:

    • New students may be accommodated in halls of residence.
    • There wasn't enough space to accommodate the files.

• staff（人, 全體員工）

  • the group of people who work for an organization:

    • There is a good relationship between staff and pupils at the school.
    • The staff are not very happy about the latest pay increase.
    • There are over a hundred staff in the company.
    • He is on (= a member of) the editorial staff of the magazine.、

第五段

In the short term, these problems have an obvious answer: let people work from home, or bring them into the office in shifts(maybe two days a week).This will limit serendipity but is better than nothing .The trickier question is whether office design will change in the longer run.

重点词汇

• trickier(困難的, 難辦的,)

  • If a piece of work or problem is tricky, it is difficult to deal with and needs careful attention or skill:

    • It's tricky to learn to ride a skateboard, but you never forget how.
    • I'm in a tricky situation - whatever I do I'll offend someone.

• serendipity（機緣，幸運）

  • the fact of finding interesting or valuable things by chance

    • There is a real element of serendipity in archaeology.

第六段

Some high-tech solutions floated before the pandemic appear newly relevant . Zaha Hadid Arcitects, a big British firm, had designed an eco-friendly building in sharjah, a city in the United Arab Emirates, with "contactless pathways", where employees rarely need to touch the building with their hands.Doors open automatically using motion sensors and facial recognition; lifts( and even a cuppa) can be ordered from a smartphone.

重点词汇

• float(不下沈, 漂浮)

  • to stay on the surface of a liquid and not sink

    • An empty bottle will float.
    • You can float very easily in/on the Dead Sea because it's so salty.
    • We lashed together anything that would float to make a raft.

• emirates

  • a country or state ruled by an emir

    • In the first decade of the emirate, the under-funded municipal administrations were failing to carry out many of their most essential tasks.

• cuppa

  • a cup of tea

    • Make us a cuppa, will you, love?

第七段

Other ideas emerged in response to covid-19 . Besides hand sanitiser at the entrance and touch-free doors, an office in Amsterdam designed by Cushman & Wakefield , a property-services group, has desks surrounded by a zone of colour-coded carpet to let people know when they are getting too close. At the start of the day workers pick up a paper deskpad on which to rest their laptop, and which is discarded when they leave. Arrows on the floor guide them to move around clockwise

重点词汇

• emerge（出現, 出現）

  • to appear by coming out of something or out from behind something:

    • She emerged from the sea, blue with cold.

• sanitiser

  • a liquid for washing your hands in order to get rid of harmful bacteria from them:

    • Public health officials have urged people to slow the spread of flu by washing their hands frequently or using a hand sanitizer.
    • He was constantly rubbing his hands with sanitizer because he had a lot of hands to shake.

• Amsterdam

  • the capital city of the Netherlands, situated in the western part of the country

    • 阿姆斯特丹，有时也称其为荷京，是荷兰首都及最大城市，位于该国西部省份北荷兰省

• Cushman & Wakefield（戴德梁行）

  • 一家美国私人房地产咨询公司

    • 成立于1917年，该公司在60个国家拥有约400个办事处，拥有约53000名员工

• carpet（地毯, 地毯織物）

  • (a shaped piece of) thick material used for covering floors:

    • We've just had a new carpet fitted/laid in our bedroom.
    • We've got fitted (= cut to fit exactly) carpets in the bedrooms.

• discard（拋棄，扔掉,）

  • to throw something away or get rid of it because you no longer want or need it:

    • Discarded food containers and bottles littered the streets.

• clockwise（順時針方向的）

  • in the direction in which the hands (= thin parts that point) of a clock move:

    • Turn the knob clockwise/in a clockwise direction.

第八段

All very clever. You could even imagine it working-for a few weeks. But after a while the rules would surely be broken. Bert wants to talk to Ernie who is within sight and just a dozen feet away in an anticlockwise direction. will he really take the long route around? And physical distance from colleagues is one thing. The potential for germs to be spread via communal items and surfaces is another. Think about the handle on thte kettle or the controls of the photocopier. The much-loved snack cupboard at The Economist is probably doomed.

重点词汇

• dozen（十二個）

  • twelve

    • a dozen eggs
    • This recipe makes three dozen cookies.

• germ（生物體）

  • a very small organism that causes disease:

    • Wash your hands so you don't get germs on the food.
    • Rats and flies spread germs.

• communal（共有的, 公共的）

  • belonging to or used by a group of people rather than one single person:

    • communal facilities/food/property
    • We each have a separate bedroom but share a communal kitchen.

• kettle（水壺，開水壺）

  • a container for boiling water, that has a lid, handle, and spout and is made from plastic or metal

    • I think this kettle is defunct!
    • This kettle needs descaling.
    • I don't like the design of this kettle.

• photocopier（复印机…）

  • a machine that makes copies of documents using a photographic process

    • Any photocopier contains the technology for a scanner and a printer.

• snack（小吃，點心）

  • a small amount of food that is eaten between meals, or a very small meal:

    • I had a huge lunch, so I'll only need a snack for dinner.
    • Fresh or dried fruit makes an ideal snack.
    • Many snack foods are high in salt, sugar, and fat.

• cupboard（櫥櫃, 壁櫥）

  • a piece of furniture or a space for storing things, with a door or doors and usually with shelves:

    • a kitchen cupboard
    • I found these apples going mouldy in the cupboard.
    • I heard a voice from the cupboard shouting "Let me out!"

• doom(死亡, 毀滅,)

  • death, destruction, or any very bad situation that cannot be avoided:

    • A sense of doom hung over the entire country.
    • The newspapers are always full of doom and gloom (= bad news and unhappiness) these days.

第九段

The new emphasis will be on cleanliness. Facilities managers will take a leaf from " The Restaurant at the End of the Universe", a science-fiction novel by Douglas Adams, where the Golgafrin-chans exiled telephone sanitisers and other useless people (such as insurance salesmen and management consultants ) on a spaceship, only for their planet's population to be wiped out by a virus contracted from a dirty handset.

重点词汇

• emphasis(重視, 強調)

  • the particular importance or attention that is given to something:

    • I think we should put as much emphasis on preventing disease as we do on curing it.
    • Schools here put/place/lay great emphasis on written work and grammar.

• facilities(建筑物)

  • a place, especially including buildings, where a particular activity happens:

    • a nuclear research facility
    • a nuclear research facility
    • a new sports facility

• exiled

  • sent away from your own country, town, etc., especially for political reasons:

    • the exiled king
    • The exiled minister is now living in India.

• wipe out(完全摧毀…)

  • to destroy something completely

    • Whole villages were wiped out in the fighting.
    • One bad harvest could wipe out all of a grower's profits for the previous two years.

• contract(合同, 契約)

  • a legal document that states and explains a formal agreement between two different people or groups

    • a contract of employment
    • a temporary/building contract

• handset(手機, 行動電話)

  • a mobile phone:

    • You may be tempted by the offer of a 40% discount off the price of a new pay-as-you-talk handset.
    • a handset maker/manufacturer