Reading list · 13 books

How the city was built

Books on the bridges, aqueducts, subways, skyscrapers and parks, and the people who paid for and planned them.

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The history

The Power Broker (opens Bookshop.org)

Robert Moses and the Fall of New York

Robert A. Caro · 1974

Robert Moses built the parkways, bridges and housing projects that reshaped the city without ever winning an election. Caro's biography shows how, and who was displaced along the way. It won the Pulitzer Prize for Biography.
The history

The Great Bridge (opens Bookshop.org)

The Epic Story of the Building of the Brooklyn Bridge

David McCullough · 1972

John Roebling, Washington Roebling and Emily Roebling built the Brooklyn Bridge between 1869 and 1883. McCullough tells it, including the caisson disease that disabled Washington.
The history

722 Miles (opens Bookshop.org)

The Building of the Subways and How They Transformed New York

Clifton Hood · 1993

The subway from its 1904 opening through the unification of the lines in 1940, with the politics of financing them and their effect on neighborhoods.
The history

Tunneling to the Future (opens Bookshop.org)

The Story of the Great Subway Expansion That Saved New York

Peter Derrick · 2001

Derrick's subject is the Dual Contracts of 1913, which doubled the subway network, and the engineering and finance behind that expansion.
The history

Grand Central (opens Bookshop.org)

How a Train Station Transformed America

Sam Roberts · 2013

Roberts tells the terminal's story from its 1913 opening through the fight to save it from demolition and its restoration.
The history

Water for Gotham (opens Bookshop.org)

A History

Gerard T. Koeppel · 2000

The city's search for clean water, from Dutch wells through the Croton Aqueduct of 1842 to the Catskill and Delaware systems.
The history

Empire of Water (opens Bookshop.org)

An Environmental and Political History of the New York City Water Supply

David Soll · 2013

Soll writes about how the city reached into the Catskills and Delaware headwaters for its water, and the fights with upstate towns and farmers that came with it.
The history

Wedding of the Waters (opens Bookshop.org)

The Erie Canal and the Making of a Great Nation

Peter L. Bernstein · 2005

Bernstein explains the politics and engineering behind the Erie Canal, and how it made New York the country's leading port.
The history

The Greatest Grid (opens Bookshop.org)

The Master Plan of Manhattan, 1811-2011

Hilary Ballon · 2012

Essays and maps on the 1811 Commissioners' Plan that laid out Manhattan's street grid, and how it shaped building, property and daily life over two centuries.
The history

The Park and the People (opens Bookshop.org)

A History of Central Park

Roy Rosenzweig and Elizabeth Blackmar · 1992

Rosenzweig and Blackmar cover the park from the 1850s land taking through its design and a century and a half of use, and who was displaced and who came.
The history

The Empire State Building (opens Bookshop.org)

The Making of a Landmark

John Tauranac · 1995

Tauranac describes the building's planning, design and record-fast construction in 1930 and 1931, and its owners' struggle to fill it.
The history

Higher (opens Bookshop.org)

A Historic Race to the Sky and the Making of a City

Neal Bascomb · 2003

The race between the Chrysler Building and 40 Wall Street to become the world's tallest, and the architects and builders behind each.
The history

High Line (opens Bookshop.org)

The Inside Story of New York City's Park in the Sky

Joshua David and Robert Hammond · 2011

The two founders of Friends of the High Line tell how a neighborhood group saved an abandoned rail viaduct and turned it into a park.