The Fires: How a Computer Formula, Big Ideas, and the Best of Intentions Burned Down New York City-and Determined the Future of Cities
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | 4.50 (734 Votes) |
| Asin | : | 1594488983 |
| Format Type | : | paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 336 Pages |
| Publish Date | : | 2015-09-06 |
| Language | : | English |
DESCRIPTION:
The RAND boys were the best and brightest, and bore all the sheen of modern American success. New York City, 1968. Conventional wisdom would blame arson, but these fires were the result of something altogether different: the intentional withdrawal of fire protection from the city's poorest neighborhoods-all based on RAND's computer modeling systems. New York City, on the other hand, seemed old-fashioned, insular, and corrupt-and the new mayor was eager for outside help, especially something as innovative and infallible as "computer modeling." A deal was struck: RAND would begin its first major civilian effort with the FDNY. The Fires is a must read for anyone curious about how a modern city works.. Despite the disastrous consequences, New York City in the 1970s set the template for how a modern city functions-both literally, as RAND sold its computer models to cities across the country, and systematically, as a new wave of technocratic decision-making took hold, which persists to this day. The RAND Corporation had presented an alluring proposal to a city on the brink of economic collapse: Using RAND's computer models, which had been successfully implemented in high-level military operations, the cit
Insightful and brilliantly written Joe Flood hsa an incredible voice - combining an earthy vernacular, polymathic references to literature and history, and a real ear for great and evocative quotations. Every chapter ended with a great cliffhanger that made the book really move and kept me as the reader charging forward. This is non-fiction at its best - richly written, dramatic, and with characters that rival any novel.I was fascinated (and shocked) to read the story of how the city-planning elite systematically destroyed whole neig. NEW YORK CITY BURNING Fire Marshal Jack Being in the field of fire investigation, and having worked with various NYC Fire Marshals over the years, including during certain of the times in the Book, I was rather shocked to finally see in print what many suspected was occuring "back then". There was an increase in the area of "fire investigation", which typically may indicate more "arsons" being detected, but the continuing $$ cutbacks and the seeming lack of concern over the FD closings and relocations, just added to the overall problem. S. Manzikert said How institutional racism and the arrogance of NY's liberal élite burned down the Bronx. If you've ever seen pictures of the horrendous urban decay and devastation of the Bronx in the '70s, or seen films like Fort Apache the Bronx or Wolfen and wondered how once thriving multi-ethnic inner city communities could end up looking like a post-apocalyptic wasteland, this book tells that astonishing and little understood story, which inspired the immortal and apocryphal phrase the 'Bronx is Burning'.The book explains how elitist arrogance and what we would now term institutional racism, drove
Writing a Best and the Brightest for the urban crisis, Flood takes you on a harrowing ladder-level tour of city firefighting, while performing the more difficult feat of making intellectual and bureaucratic history just as fascinating and dramatic. . --Tom NissleyAuthor Q&A with Joe Flood Joe Flood is a journalist who has spent years researching the facts and implications of the epidemic of fires that swept through New York City in the 1970s. But why? The usual suspect was arson, by greedy slumlords encouraged by wrong-headed welfare schemes, but in his first book, The Fires, Joe Flood tells a different story. Tracing the history of the New York fire department, and especially the career of on