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Tag Archives: infrastructure
A Walk Around the Block
A Walk Around the Block: Stoplight Secrets, Mischievous Squirrels, Manhole Mysteries & Other Stuff You See Every Day (And Know Nothing About)© 2020 Spike Carlsen336 pages One of my favorite books to think back on is Scott Huler’s On the … Continue reading
Posted in Politics and Civic Interest, Reviews
Tagged bicycles, energy, infrastructure, Politics-CivicInterest, waste
4 Comments
Door to Door
Door to Door: The Magnificent, Maddening, Mysterious World of Transportation© 2016 Edward Humes384 pages Are you interested in the Port of Los Angeles? Do you hate cars and find hushed reports of every auto death in a single day great … Continue reading
Empires of Light
Empires of Light: Edison, Tesla, Westinghouse, and the Race to Electrify the World © 2004 Jill Jonnes464 pages Empires of Light is less a history of how the United States became electrified and more a biography of three electrical titans – … Continue reading
Posted in history, Reviews
Tagged biography, energy, history, history of science, infrastructure
1 Comment
Infrastructure: A Field Guide
Infrastructure: A Field Guide to the Industrial Landscape© 1999, 2014 Brian Hayes544 pages Here at last is a book for those of us who constantly gaze out the car window at the fixtures on utility poles, or drums mounted in … Continue reading
The Works
The Works: Anatomy of a City© 2005 Kate Ascher240 pages Cities are, for my money, mankind’s most astonishing invention. Their complexity is stupefying — system within system, handling tons of material at any given time, whether the subject is cars … Continue reading
Posted in history, Politics and Civic Interest, Reviews
Tagged cities, civic awareness, energy, history, infrastructure, NYC, Politics-CivicInterest, trains, transportation, waste
2 Comments
The Road Taken
The Road Taken: The History and Future of America’s Infrastructure336 pages© 2016 Henry Petroski What, exactly, is The Road Taken? Its title declares it a history, which is mostly true. It does have a bounty of historic sketches on the … Continue reading
Divided Highways
Divided Highways: Building the Interstate Highways, Transforming American Life© Tom Lewis 2007, 2013416 pages No engineering project in the United States is more impressive than the interstate system; dense with the connections of a street grid, it serves not blocks … Continue reading
Posted in Politics and Civic Interest, Reviews
Tagged Boston, cities, civic awareness, infrastructure, Politics-CivicInterest, transportation
4 Comments
Tubes
Tubes: A Journey to the Center of the Internet© 2012 Andrew Blum303 pages It turns out Ted Stevens was right: the Internet really is a series of tubes, connecting large boxes, and usually in nondescript warehouses that look like self-storage units. … Continue reading
On the Grid
On the Grid: A Plot of Land, an Average Neighborhood, and the Systems That Make Our World Work© 2010 Scott Huler256 pages If modern humans have retained a penchant for magical thinking, little wonder. Our homes accomplish marvels seemingly by the … Continue reading
Posted in history, Politics and Civic Interest, Reviews
Tagged cities, civic awareness, energy, history, infrastructure, Politics-CivicInterest, transportation, waste
7 Comments
The Grid
The Grid: A Journey Through the Heart of Our Electrified World© 2007 Phillip Schewe310 pages In every room there sits a caged beast waiting to cause mischief, but which most of the time is put to honest work, instead. When … Continue reading