Triumph of the City by Edward L Glaeser

A great book that really made me think about the relative physical and environmental costs of city and rural life, why cities came about across the globe, the rise of industry, and the social outcome that describes how a large population of people living close together can generate extreme productivity and new ideas.  It elegantly speaks about the human need as young adults to live in close proximity to each other, sparking exciting exchanges of ideas and invention but as they age and have families and children and then retire other needs come to the fore, good schooling, nice countryside and green spaces leading to suburbanisation.  Glaeser addresses the issues that both first and developing world cities face, slums, transportation, disease, water quality, congestion, green spaces, industry, work and housing costs.

Glaser's book is extremely informative on the taxation system of America which is very different from the British one.  Taxation on fuel which allows access to suburban areas is much higher and we have direct taxation via yearly statutory tax discs which pay for road upkeep, car users also have graduated insurance premiums which, along with congestion charging in some areas, do make road users think seriously about their usage.  I find the United States' low taxation on and high usage of such a finite resource as gasoline horrifying. Unlike America we don't have mortgage tax relief, but we do have a lot in common when it comes to suburbanising for a better quality of life. 

Here in Scotland suburban and urban are not so clear cut, apart from the central belt much of what Glaeser speaks about is slightly modified, the northern cities are smaller and surrounded by small towns which have good amenties and transport links as well as extreme rural areas where private vehicles are the only feasible method of transport.  However, we are similar in that even in these small towns transport links are still not good or cost effective enough to replace the affordability and convenience of having personal transport, especially over longer distances where rail travel is much more expensive than cars and buses are achingly slow.

There are a few problems with the text itself, with copy editing issues which were a bit annoying, and Glaeser does repeat himself at times, but generally I am grateful for a book which taught me so much.