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Car Country: An Environmental History
- Weyerhaeuser Environmental Books
- Narrated by: Scott Carrico
- Length: 12 hrs
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Car Country: An Environmental History
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Publisher's Summary
For most people in the United States, going almost anywhere begins with reaching for the car keys. This is true, Christopher Wells argues, because the United States is Car Country, a nation dominated by landscapes that are difficult, inconvenient, and often unsafe to navigate by those who are not sitting behind the wheel of a car.
The prevalence of car-dependent landscapes seems perfectly natural to us today, but it is, in fact, a relatively new historical development. In Car Country, Wells rejects the idea that the nation's automotive status quo can be explained as a simple byproduct of an ardent love affair with the automobile. Instead, he takes listeners on a tour of the evolving American landscape, charting the ways that transportation policies and land-use practices have combined to reshape nearly every element of the built environment around the easy movement of automobiles. Wells untangles the complicated relationships between automobiles and the environment, allowing listeners to see the everyday world in a completely new way. The result is a history that is essential for understanding American transportation and land-use issues today.
"An excellent and needed addition." (The Michigan Historical Review)
"Wells's book is a remarkable achievement." (Southern California Quarterly)
"Wells offers a terrific excavation of the sprawlscape that still drives our days." (Human Ecology)
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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- Andrew Desbrow
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Flesh it out a bit more
Author seemed wholly intent on spending every chapter then every proceeding one, recovering the same information. Whether it was regularly reiterating the same material every few pages or seemingly stepping back with the start of every new chapter, I decided 3hrs from finishing I had learned enough. It was as though the author felt obliged to make every chapter a full third longe than needed.
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 66
This first full-scale history of the development of the American suburb examines how "the good life" in America came to be equated with the a home of one's own surrounded by a grassy yard and located far from the urban workplace. Integrating social history with economic and architectural analysis, and taking into account such factors as the availability of cheap land, inexpensive building methods, and rapid transportation, Kenneth Jackson chronicles the phenomenal growth of the American suburb from the middle of the 19th century to the present day.
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4 out of 5 stars
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fascinating history 📜
- By AGN on 07-27-22
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Green Metropolis
- What the City Can Teach the Country About True Sustainability
- By: David Owen
- Narrated by: Patrick Lawlor
- Length: 9 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 66
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 45
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Story4 out of 5 stars 45
In this remarkable challenge to conventional thinking about the environment, David Owen argues that the greenest community in the United States is not Portland, Oregon, or Snowmass, Colorado, but New York City.
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2 out of 5 stars
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A stupid and dangerously short sighted view
- By Gare&Sophia on 11-13-12
By: David Owen
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Triumph of the City
- How Our Greatest Invention Makes Us Richer, Smarter, Greener, Healthier, and Happier
- By: Edward Glaeser
- Narrated by: Lloyd James
- Length: 12 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 414
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 341
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 336
America is an urban nation. More than two thirds of us live on the three percent of land that contains our cities. Yet cities get a bad rap: they're dirty, poor, unhealthy, crime ridden, expensive, environmentally unfriendly. Or are they? As Edward Glaeser proves in this myth-shattering book, cities are actually the healthiest, greenest, and richest (in cultural and economic terms) places to live.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Urbanophile Brain Candy
- By Clay Downing on 12-18-15
By: Edward Glaeser
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The Road Taken
- The History and Future of America's Infrastructure
- By: Henry Petroski
- Narrated by: Michael Butler Murray
- Length: 10 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 54
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 45
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Story4 out of 5 stars 45
Physical infrastructure in the United States is crumbling. The American Society of Civil Engineers has, in its latest report, given American roads and bridges a grade of D and C+, respectively, and has described roughly 65,000 bridges in the United States as 'structurally deficient'. This crisis - and one need look no further than the I-35W bridge collapse in Minnesota to see that it is indeed a crisis - shows little sign of abating short of a massive change in attitude amongst politicians and the American public.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Well put
- By Lawrence on 08-10-17
By: Henry Petroski
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Climate of Hope
- How Cities, Businesses, and Citizens Can Save the Planet
- By: Michael Bloomberg, Carl Pope
- Narrated by: Michael R. Bloomberg - introduction, Charles Pellett, Carl Pope
- Length: 9 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 209
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 187
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 186
From Mayor Michael Bloomberg and former head of the Sierra Club Carl Pope comes a manifesto on how the benefits of taking action on climate change are concrete, immediate, and immense. They explore climate change solutions that will make the world healthier and more prosperous, aiming to begin a new type of conversation on the issue that will spur bolder action by cities, businesses, and citizens—and even, someday, by Washington.
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5 out of 5 stars
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INCREDIBLE
- By David Cohn on 06-22-17
By: Michael Bloomberg, and others
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A Question of Power
- Electricity and the Wealth of Nations
- By: Robert Bryce
- Narrated by: Robert Bryce
- Length: 8 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 125
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 105
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 103
Global demand for power is doubling every two decades, but electricity remains one of the most difficult forms of energy to supply and do so reliably. Veteran journalist Robert Bryce tells the human story of electricity, the world's most important form of energy. Through onsite reporting from India, Iceland, Lebanon, Puerto Rico, New York, and Colorado, he shows how our cities, our money - our very lives - depend on reliable flows of electricity. He highlights the factors needed for successful electrification and explains why so many people are still stuck in the dark.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Not the complete story
- By John on 08-11-20
By: Robert Bryce
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The Rise and Fall of American Growth
- The U.S. Standard of Living Since the Civil War
- By: Robert J. Gordon
- Narrated by: Michael Butler Murray
- Length: 30 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 503
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 415
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 413
In the century after the Civil War, an economic revolution improved the American standard of living in ways previously unimaginable. Electric lighting, indoor plumbing, home appliances, motor vehicles, air travel, air conditioning, and television transformed households and workplaces. With medical advances, life expectancy between 1870 and 1970 grew from 45 to 72 years. The Rise and Fall of American Growth provides an in-depth account of this momentous era.
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1 out of 5 stars
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Over-detailed, with no engaging message
- By BehA on 01-31-17
By: Robert J. Gordon
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Confessions of a Recovering Engineer
- Transportation for a Strong Town
- By: Charles L. Marohn Jr.
- Narrated by: Christopher Douyard
- Length: 9 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 161
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 136
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 135
In Confessions of a Recovering Engineer, renowned speaker and author of Strong Towns Charles L. Marohn, Jr., delivers an accessible and engaging exploration of America's transportation system, laying bare the reasons why it no longer works as it once did, and how to modernize transportation to better serve local communities.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Well Worth Your Time To Read or Listen To!
- By Cliff on 02-08-22
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Power Trip
- The Story of Energy
- By: Michael E. Webber
- Narrated by: L. J. Ganser
- Length: 9 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 65
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 56
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 55
Energy is humanity's single most important resource. In fact, as energy expert Michael E. Webber argues in Power Trip, the story of how societies rise can be told largely as the story of how they manage energy sources through time. In 2019, as we face down growing demand for and accumulating environmental impacts from energy, we are at a crossroads and the stakes are high. But history shows us that energy's great value is that it allows societies to reinvent themselves.
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4 out of 5 stars
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A History of Energy for Everybody
- By Brian Shivers on 08-14-19
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Behemoth
- A History of the Factory and the Making of the Modern World
- By: Joshua B. Freeman
- Narrated by: Stephen Bowlby
- Length: 13 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 240
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 203
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 201
We live in a factory-made world: modern life is built on three centuries of advances in factory production, efficiency, and technology. But giant factories have also fueled our fears about the future since their beginnings, when William Blake called them "dark Satanic mills". Many factories that operated over the last two centuries - such as Homestead, River Rouge, and Foxconn - were known for the labor exploitation and class warfare they engendered, not to mention the environmental devastation caused by factory production.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Get rid of the fake accents
- By J. R. Valery on 03-13-18
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Connectography
- Mapping the Future of Global Civilization
- By: Parag Khanna
- Narrated by: Paul Boehmer
- Length: 16 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 167
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 138
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Story4 out of 5 stars 140
In Connectography, visionary strategist Parag Khanna travels from Ukraine to Iran, Mongolia to North Korea, Pakistan to Nigeria, and across the Arctic Circle to explain the unprecedented changes affecting every part of the planet. He shows how militaries are deployed to protect supply chains as much as borders, and how nations are less at war over territory than engaged in tugs-of-war over pipelines, railways, shipping lanes, and Internet cables. The new arms race is to connect to the most markets.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Great book but the narrator is a drag
- By MMC on 11-10-16
By: Parag Khanna
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The Great Reset
- How New Ways of Living and Working Drive Post-Crash Prosperity
- By: Richard Florida
- Narrated by: Eric Conger
- Length: 6 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 130
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 80
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Story4 out of 5 stars 78
We tend to view prolonged economic downturns, such as the Great Depression of the 1930s and the Long Depression of the late 19th century, in terms of the crisis and pain they cause. But history teaches us that these great crises also represent opportunities to remake our economy and society and to generate whole new eras of economic growth and prosperity.
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1 out of 5 stars
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glorification of City Life
- By Ryan Riggs on 11-25-20
By: Richard Florida
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Street Smart
- The Rise of Cities and the Fall of Cars
- By: Samuel I. Schwartz, William Rosen - contributor
- Narrated by: Don Hagen
- Length: 9 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 126
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 113
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 113
With wit and sharp insight, former Traffic Commissioner of New York City, Sam Schwartz a.k.a. "Gridlock Sam", one of the most respected transportation engineers in the world and consummate insider in NYC political circles, uncovers how American cities became so beholden to cars and why the current shift away from that trend will forever alter America's urban landscapes, marking nothing short of a revolution in how we get from place to place.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Interesting, thought provoking, and hopeful
- By JKuster on 03-07-20
By: Samuel I. Schwartz, and others
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The High Cost of Free Parking, Updated Edition
- By: Donald Shoup
- Narrated by: Mike Chamberlain
- Length: 23 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 59
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 45
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 44
In this no-holds-barred treatise, Donald Shoup argues that free parking has contributed to auto dependence, rapid urban sprawl, extravagant energy use, and a host of other problems. Planners mandate free parking to alleviate congestion but end up distorting transportation choices, debasing urban design, damaging the economy, and degrading the environment. Ubiquitous free parking helps explain why our cities sprawl on a scale fit more for cars than for people. But it doesn't have to be this way.
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5 out of 5 stars
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A Great Listen
- By abdelrahmanazmi on 08-02-22
By: Donald Shoup
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The Source
- How Rivers Made America and America Remade Its Rivers
- By: Martin Doyle
- Narrated by: Keith Sellon-Wright
- Length: 10 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 43
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 39
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 40
In this fresh and powerful work of environmental history, Martin Doyle explores how rivers have often been the source of arguments at the heart of the American experiment - over federalism, taxation, regulation, conservation, and development. Doyle tells the epic story of America and its rivers, from the US Constitution's roots in interstate river navigation, the origins of the Army Corps of Engineers, the discovery of gold in 1848, and the construction of the Hoover Dam and the TVA during the New Deal, to the failure of the levees in Hurricane Katrina.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Great historical read without compare.
- By Thomas P Dore on 04-10-18
By: Martin Doyle
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The End of the World Is Just the Beginning
- Mapping the Collapse of Globalization
- By: Peter Zeihan
- Narrated by: Peter Zeihan
- Length: 16 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall5 out of 5 stars 4,463
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 3,963
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Story5 out of 5 stars 3,930
For generations, everything has been getting faster, better, and cheaper. Finally, we reached the point that almost anything you could ever want could be sent to your home within days—even hours—of when you decided you wanted it. America made that happen, but now America has lost interest in keeping it going. Peter Zeihan maps out the next world: a world where countries or regions will have no choice but to make their own goods, grow their own food, secure their own energy, fight their own battles, and do it all with populations that are both shrinking and aging.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Everyone dies except Americans
- By preetam on 06-22-22
By: Peter Zeihan
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The Well-Tempered City
- What Modern Science, Ancient Civilizations, and Human Nature Teach Us About the Future of Urban Life
- By: Jonathan F. P. Rose
- Narrated by: Barry Abrams
- Length: 14 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 71
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 62
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 61
Cities are birthplaces of civilization; centers of culture, trade, and progress; cauldrons of opportunity - and the home of 80 percent of the world's population by 2050. As the 21st century progresses, metropolitan areas will bear the brunt of global megatrends such as climate change, natural resource depletion, population growth, income inequality, mass migrations, and education and health disparities, among many others.
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3 out of 5 stars
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The best way to save the future is to look at the past
- By Kate on 10-01-22