The Works: Anatomy of a City
by Kate Ascher
List Price:
Our Price: $11.34
You Save: $10.66 (48%)
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Buy Used: from $7.60 (click here)
Category: Book
See more book details and other editions
Book Summary Information
Author: Kate AscherEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2007-11-27
ISBN: 0143112708
Number of pages: 240
Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics)
Book Reviews of The Works: Anatomy of a City
Book Review: Great Book for Evening Read or for the Coffee Table
Summary: 5 Stars
This is a geeks delight. The book is great as it disects and explains all the different systems and components that makes NYC function without being overly detailed or hard to digest: subways, railroads, ships, power supply, water supply, electricity generation and supply, sewage, recycling, manholes, and much much more...
Each page has sharp and enjoyable illustrations that break down the systems, map out how everything works from beginning to end, and leave you with a better understanding of what it takes to make any city run. Although this book focuses on what makes NYC run, you can easily apply the civil engineering components to just about any other modern city.
You can pick up and pick any page in the middle of the book as it can be read as an encyclopedia, or you can read it from beginning to end (like I did) without being overwhelmed with the details.
Bottom line: fun in a very geeky way, easy to pick up and read for a few minutes or a couple of hours, great illustrations that will get any reader hooked and a terrific compliment for anyone to enjoy the cities on a different level. A
Summary of The Works: Anatomy of a City
Read Kate Ascher's posts on the Penguin Blog.
A fascinating guided tour of the ways things work in a modern city
Have you ever wondered how the water in your faucet gets there? Where your garbage goes? What the pipes under city streets do? How bananas from Ecuador get to your local market? Why radiators in apartment buildings clang? Using New York City as its point of reference, The Works takes readers down manholes and behind the scenes to explain exactly how an urban infrastructure operates. Deftly weaving text and graphics, author Kate Ascher explores the systems that manage water, traffic, sewage and garbage, subways, electricity, mail, and much more. Full of fascinating facts and anecdotes, The Works gives readers a unique glimpse at what lies behind and beneath urban life in the twenty-first century.
A fascinating guided tour of the ways things work in a modern city
Have you ever wondered how the water in your faucet gets there? Where your garbage goes? What the pipes under city streets do? How bananas from Ecuador get to your local market? Why radiators in apartment buildings clang? Using New York City as its point of reference, The Works takes readers down manholes and behind the scenes to explain exactly how an urban infrastructure operates. Deftly weaving text and graphics, author Kate Ascher explores the systems that manage water, traffic, sewage and garbage, subways, electricity, mail, and much more. Full of fascinating facts and anecdotes, The Works gives readers a unique glimpse at what lies behind and beneath urban life in the twenty-first century.
Kate Ascher could not have chosen a much drier topic for a book than water mains, parking meters, railroad classification yards, and the other doodads of city infrastructure. But in Ascher's captivating book, The Works, the innards of New York City come alive. Wonderfully illustrated, the book combines text, maps, and other graphics to tell the story of the systems that keep America's greatest city running smoothly. How are traffic lights coordinated? How do potholes form and which areas have streets with the best "smoothness score"? How is mail processed? What happens when you flush the toilet? Ascher, who has a PhD in government from the London School of Economics and is now executive vice president of the New York City Economic Development Corporation, dissects the colorful workings of all these systems and much more.
The Works contains a section on pretty much every aspect of the Big Apple's infrastructure. You'll learn the mystery of the shiny silver tanks that have become a familiar sight on New York streets. (They prevent moisture from damaging underground phone lines.) Ascher explains how the city's 23 million daily pieces of mail are processed. We also learn about the 27-mile underground pneumatic mail tube that used to carry canisters with 500 letters up to 30 miles per hour around Manhattan. Also interesting: the story of the nine-foot-long, 800-pound robot submarine that city engineers send to probe leaks in the Delaware Aqueduct--which, it might interest you to know, is the world's longest continuous underground tunnel. And you'll find out all about Colonel Waring and his "White Wings." A great coffee table book for New York lovers or anyone with a curiosity bone. --Alex Roslin
Arts & Photography Books
Book Subjects
- Arts & Photography
- Biographies & Memoirs
- Business & Investing
- Children's Books
- Comics & Graphic Novels
- Computers & Internet
- Cooking, Food & Wine
- Entertainment
- Gay & Lesbian
- Health, Mind & Body
- History
- Home & Garden
- Horror
- Law
- Literature & Fiction
- Mystery & Thrillers
- Nonfiction
- Outdoors & Nature
- Parenting & Families
- Professional & Technical
- Reference
- Religion & Spirituality
- Romance
- Science
- Science Fiction & Fantasy
- Sports
- Teens
- Travel
Most talked about in Arts & Photography Books
The Interpersonal Communication Book, 10th Editionby Joseph A. DeVito
Allyn & Bacon; Published: 2003-03-10; Paperback; Book
Best price: $5.46
Price in other shops:
What Good Are the Arts?by John Carey
Oxford University Press, USA; Published: 2010-02-26; Paperback; Book
Best price: $6.59
Price in other shops:
Surrational Images: PHOTOMONTAGESby Scott Mutter
University of Illinois Press; Published: 1992-10-01; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $19.75
Price in other shops:
Printing with Adobe Photoshop CS4by Tim Daly
Focal Press; Published: 2009-05-19; Paperback; Book
Best price: $10.37
Price in other shops:
Plastic Cameras: Toying with Creativityby Michelle Bates
Unknown; Focal Press; Published: 2006-10-25; Paperback; Book
Best price: $24.99
Price in other shops:
The Humanistic Tradition, Book 1: The First Civilizations and the Classical Legacyby Gloria Fiero
McGraw-Hill Humanities/Social Sciences/Languages; Published: 2010-01-29; Paperback; Book
Best price: $31.96
Patternmaking for Fashion Design (5th Edition)by Helen Joseph Armstrong
Prentice Hall; Published: 2009-10-26; Hardcover-spiral; Book
Best price: $94.00
Price in other shops:
Walking the Bible: A Photographic Journeyby Bruce Feiler
PBS; William Morrow; Published: 2005-10-25; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $10.38
Price in other shops:
Lives of the Circus Animals: A Novelby Christopher Bram
William Morrow; Published: 2003-09-30; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $0.65
Price in other shops:
Respect for Actingby Uta Hagen
Macmillan; Published: 1973-09-01; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $3.99
Price in other shops:
Similar Books and other products
Unquenchable: America's Water Crisis and What To Do About Itby Robert Glennon
Island Press; Published: 2010-09-23; Paperback; Book
Best price: $12.50
Price in other shops:
The Fires: How a Computer Formula, Big Ideas, and the Best of Intentions Burned Down New York City--and Determined the Future of Citiesby Joe Flood
Riverhead Trade; Published: 2011-04-05; Paperback; Book
Best price: $10.00
Price in other shops:
Beneath the Metropolis: The Secret Lives of Citiesby Alex Marshall
Running Press; Published: 2007-10-12; Paperback; Book
Best price: $29.55
Infrastructure: A Field Guide to the Industrial Landscapeby Brian Hayes
W. W. Norton; Published: 2005-09-26; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $31.58
Price in other shops:
On the Grid: A Plot of Land, An Average Neighborhood, and the Systems that Make Our World Workby Scott Huler
Rodale Books; Published: 2010-05-11; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $4.54
Price in other shops:
Transit Maps of the Worldby Mark Ovenden
Penguin (Non-Classics); Published: 2007-10-30; Paperback; Book
Best price: $12.99
Price in other shops:
Engineering the City: How Infrastructure Worksby Matthys Levy, Richard Panchyk
Chicago Review Press; Published: 2000-10-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $6.16
Price in other shops:
Undergroundby David Macaulay
Graphia; Published: 1983-03-23; Paperback; Book
Best price: $5.16
Price in other shops:
Infrastructure: A Field Guide to the Industrial Landscapeby Brian Hayes
W. W. Norton & Company; Published: 2006-09-17; Paperback; Book
Best price: $21.00
Price in other shops:
The Heights: Anatomy of a Skyscraperby Kate Ascher
Penguin Press HC, The; Published: 2011-11-10; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $15.44
Price in other shops: