The town that had to leave home – C1 English Reading Test

C1 English Reading Test

Read the text about the relocation of a Swedish town. For questions 1–6, choose the correct answer (A, B, C or D).

The town that had to leave home

On 19 August 2025, Bo Henriksson stood outside Kiruna Church as it prepared to leave the site it had occupied for more than a century. Henriksson had moved to the town at twelve and spent three decades there. The church was bound up with baptisms, funerals, weddings and school ceremonies from his life. Watching the old centre being taken apart, he found the experience both sad and brutal. The church would survive. The streets and buildings around it would not.

The scene captures the dilemma facing thousands of people in Kiruna, a mining town in northern Sweden. The iron-ore mine beneath it has provided employment and shaped the community for 125 years. It is also causing the rock above it to shift as mining extends deeper underground. Cracks and subsidence are gradually making parts of Kiruna unsafe. The town is not so much being destroyed by the mine as being forced to move so that both can survive.

Closing the mine is scarcely a viable alternative. Kiruna developed around it, and much of the local economy still depends on it. Instead, a new centre has been built approximately three kilometres east of the old one. At least 3,000 homes are affected and around 6,000 people must relocate. Many buildings will be demolished and replaced, while a small number of culturally important structures have been preserved.

Kiruna Church is the most spectacular example. The 600-tonne wooden building was lifted onto a special trailer and carried intact along a five-kilometre route. Its slow journey attracted crowds and international attention. For some, it demonstrated an extraordinary commitment to the town’s heritage. Yet it also exposed an uncomfortable distinction: a famous building can be placed on steel beams and transported, whereas the life lived around it cannot.

Residents do receive compensation, though perhaps we should put a question mark after that word. Homeowners may be offered another property or the market value of their home plus 25 per cent, while tenants receive priority for new accommodation. On paper, this seems relatively generous. Nevertheless, financial value is nowhere near as straightforward as emotional value. An additional payment may cover the price of a larger kitchen; it cannot compensate for neighbours who move elsewhere, a familiar walk to work or the accumulated memories attached to an ordinary street.

The new Kiruna may eventually offer advantages that the old centre lacked. It is more compact, and its modern homes and public spaces have been deliberately planned. But this is also its drawback. Towns normally acquire their character untidily, through habits, chance encounters and buildings used in ways their designers never anticipated. A newly constructed centre can provide places for community life, but it cannot manufacture the history that makes those places meaningful.

Kiruna’s transformation is therefore both an engineering project and a test of what people mean by place. Planners must strike a balance between physical safety, economic survival and emotional continuity. Given the alternatives, relocation may be the least damaging solution available. Even so, it involves a profound trade-off: the community can remain together only by leaving behind the ground on which it became a community.

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Page 1 of 6

1 What can be inferred about Bo Henriksson from the text?

A. He had lived near the church for decades.

B. He had recently experienced something painful there.

C. He had many personal memories connected with the church.

D. He worked at the church or somewhere nearby.

Page 2 of 6

2 Which idea is conveyed in the second paragraph?

A. The industry sustaining Kiruna is also making its present location uninhabitable.

B. Keeping the mine open requires residents to remain in increasingly unsafe homes.

C. Relocating the town will protect jobs but end its economic dependence on mining.

D. Closing the mine would make it impossible to finance the construction of a new town.

Page 3 of 6

3 Why might the church's journey give a false impression of Kiruna's relocation?

A. It may conceal the fact that moving the church was cheaper than rebuilding ordinary homes.

B. It may make local opposition to the relocation appear stronger than it actually is.

C. It may imply that preserving religious traditions is the project's principal objective.

D. It may suggest that much of the old town is being transported intact rather than replaced.

Page 4 of 6

4 What does the suggested question mark after the word 'compensation' imply?

A. Covering property losses does not make up for everything residents lose.

B. Residents cannot be certain that the promised payments will be made.

C. The market values assigned to the affected homes may be inaccurate.

D. Some categories of residents may not qualify for any form of assistance.

Page 5 of 6

5 What concern does the writer express about the redesigned centre?

A. Its dense layout may reduce the likelihood of chance encounters.

B. Its designers cannot foresee how residents will adapt to their new surroundings.

C. A purpose-built environment cannot immediately acquire an authentic local identity.

D. Its carefully planned layout may prove less practical than the one it replaces.

Page 6 of 6

6 Which statement best reflects the writer's overall view of Kiruna's transformation?

A. It is the only way to protect the interests of the mining industry.

B. The advantages of the new centre will eventually remove residents' sense of loss.

C. It has caused less disruption than originally expected.

D. It is probably the most workable solution, although something irreplaceable will be lost.

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