Breakdown of La nostra funivia è veloce, ma quella del centro è lenta.
essere
to be
ma
but
quello
that
lento
slow
Questions & Answers about La nostra funivia è veloce, ma quella del centro è lenta.
Why does the second half of the sentence use quella to mean "the one"?
In English, we say "the downtown one" to avoid repeating the noun "cable car." In Italian, you do this by using the demonstrative pronoun quello (that/that one) followed by the preposition di (of). Because it replaces the feminine singular noun funivia, quello changes to quella.
Why is it del centro instead of just di centro?
Literally, the Italian phrasing translates to "that of the center." Because the noun centro requires the definite article il, the preposition di (of) merges with il (the) to form the combined word del.
Both veloce and lenta describe the cable car. Why does one end in -e and the other in -a?
This is a great reminder about the two main groups of Italian adjectives. Lento belongs to the group that ends in -o for masculine and -a for feminine, so it becomes lenta to match the feminine noun funivia. Veloce belongs to the group that ends in -e for both masculine and feminine singular nouns, so its ending doesn't need to change.
Why do we need the article La before ?