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On The Grid: A Plot Of Land, An Average Neighborhood, And The Systems That Make Our World Work (2010)

by Scott Huler(Favorite Author)

3.59 of 5 Votes: 3

ISBN

1605296473 (ISBN13: 9781605296470)

languge

English

genre

History & Biography

publisher

Rodale Books

review 1: I used to spend a lot of time as a child lying on the ground, hands behind my head, watching the clouds and wondering what lay beneath the grass, deep down in the earth. Well, "On the Grid" would have given me many answers. What I like most about this book is that it makes you think about so many things we take for granted and assume will always be there for us. Most of us know how discombobulating it is when the lights go out, or a pipe bursts, or the trash isn't picked up on time. But we also expect somebody else to correct the problem...and quickly.When we hear that our infrastructure is aging and crumbling, how many of us understand what this really means? Scott Huler's book provides insight into just how tricky the infrastructure that supports our modern way of life r... moreeally is and how much ingenuity and expense is involved in keeping it functional. I hope everyone who resents paying taxes and thinks they can survive without any help from the government will read this book and imagine what it would be like to have to maintain all these complex, interconnected systems on their own.
review 2: I liked this book because I have, well, an odd fascination with plumbing, electricity, and how things work. Also, the book is about the infrastructure of Raleigh, North Carolina, my hometown. That's why it gets three stars instead of two. Despite my interest in the subject matter, I almost put it down because the editing of the first few chapters is ATROCIOUS, and bad editing makes me insane. Someone definitely was in a hurry to get this to press. The chapters about water and sewer are the best informationwise, and I love that the author climbed in the storm drain and attempted to follow it to its starting point. Crazy! Some of the other chapters read like they were added because, well, they're infrastructure (like cable tv and the internet), but the author wasn't really all that interested in them.I still recommend this book, because we don't think much about how our infrastructure works, but if we didn't have it, society would fall apart. less

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