Question

In spite of federal subsidizing of public transportation systems massively and major local efforts to persuade the public to use public transportation, mass transit has been steadily losing patronage to the private automobile for the past thirty years.

(A) In spite of federal subsidizing of public transportation systems massively and major local efforts to persuade
(B) In spite of massive federal subsidizing of public transportation systems and major efforts locally at persuading
(C) Despite massive federal subsidies to public transportation systems and the making of major efforts locally to persuade
(D) Despite massive federal subsidies to public transportation systems and major local efforts to persuade
(E) Despite massive federal subsidies to public transportation systems and making major local efforts at persuading

Answer 1

D). Despite massive federal subsidies to public transportation systems and major local efforts to persuade.

Step-by-step explanation:

As per the question, option D most appropriately revises the underlined part of the sentence('In spite....persuade') as it is syntactically and semantically coherent. It precisely follows parallelism(plural form in 'federal subsidies..transportation systems and local efforts') that gives a clear and comprehensive meaning. The other options are incorrect as they either contain parallelism error(inappropriate use of 'subsidizing' in option A) or unnecessarily uses the verb form('at persuading' in option B and 'making' in option C). Thus, option D is the correct answer.