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

Publisher's summary

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.

New Yorkers, for instance, live longer than other Americans; heart disease and cancer rates are lower in Gotham than in the nation as a whole. More than half of America's income is earned in 22 metropolitan areas. And city dwellers use, on average, 40 percent less energy than suburbanites. Glaeser travels through history and around the globe to reveal the hidden workings of cities and how they bring out the best in humankind. Even the worst cities---Kinshasa, Kolkata, Lagos---confer surprising benefits on the people who flock to them, including better health and more jobs than the rural areas that surround them. Glaeser visits Bangalore and Silicon Valley, whose strangely similar histories prove how essential education is to urban success and how new technology actually encourages people to gather together physically. He discovers why Detroit is dying while other old industrial cities---Chicago, Boston, New York---thrive. He investigates why a new house costs 350 percent more in Los Angeles than in Houston, even though building costs are only 25 percent higher in Los Angeles. He pinpoints the single factor that most influences urban growth---January temperatures---and explains how certain chilly cities manage to defy that link. He explains how West Coast environmentalists have harmed the environment, and how struggling cities from Youngstown to New Orleans can "shrink to greatness." And he exposes the dangerous anti-urban political bias that is harming both cities and the entire country.

©2011 Edward Glaeser (P)2011 Tantor

Critic reviews

"You'll...walk away dazzled by the greatness of cities and fascinated by this writer's nimble mind." ( The New York Times)

Triumph of the City

This is an important read for those who do not know the history and formation of cities in America and around the world. It will answer many of the guestions you may have, and those that you do not.

Education . . . and water for all my people

Would you consider the audio edition of Triumph of the City to be better than the print version?

I've only listened to the audio

What other book might you compare Triumph of the City to and why?

it is like no other that I have enjoyed

Which character – as performed by Lloyd James – was your favorite?

I don't understand your question, have you listened to the book?

If you could give Triumph of the City a new subtitle, what would it be?

aligned incentives of urban planning, the key to our future innovation

Any additional comments?

this was a fascinating listen - my daughter is graduating this year with a degree focused on urban planning for healthy living so I was extra tuned in. The ripple effects of policy, the suggestions for immigration, the keys to so many different reasons for innovation and urban success were insightful - I keep telling all my friends about it, so it must have stuck with me. I got the suggestion for the listen from an article featuring Zappos CEO, Tony Hsieh.

Very interesting perspective but can get a little dry!

I enjoyed listening to this audiobook while traveling. More difficult to pay attention when doing other things at home.

The Triumph of "Triumph of the City"

The best books help illuminate the contradictions of modern life. Edward Glaeser's masterful Triumph of the City: How Our Greatest Invention Makes Us Richer, Smarter, Greener, Healthier, and Happier is such a book.

Glaeser, an uber-productive and prolific Harvard economist, makes 4 big arguments in Triumph of the City: Cities Drive Economic and Social Progress: The density, diversity, energy, low barriers to communication, mixing of talents, and opportunities to specialize have always driven innovation and invention. Cities are the most productive places in any society, a productivity that is reflected in both higher wages and strong in-migration. Large numbers of people living closely together can catalyze and nurture ideas and connections, while providing a market for these new inventions. It is no accident that the best art, the best restaurants, the best publishing, and the best retail can all be found in cities.

Cities Are Good for the Environment: Cities are green because city folks tend to take public transportation or walk to work instead of driving. City residences are smaller, and often staked vertically, and are therefore cheaper to heat and cool than suburban homes. City infrastructure, such as water, power, and sewage can be provided at scale - where suburban or rural residents rely on individual septic tanks and wells. City parks can serve many many residents, where suburban lawns take up land (and lots of water) for the pleasure of a few homeowners.

Public Resources Should Go to Disadvantaged People, Not Disadvantaged Places: Public efforts to revitalize dying cities that have lost their economic rationale, such as Detroit or New Orleans, are usually misdirected into unwanted building rather than people. Investments in public schools pays off, as these investments both raise the human capital of the students and attract parents into cities looking for good schools. Large publicly funded projects, such as professional sports stadiums or tax payer subsidized office parks (such as Detroit's Renaissance Center) only benefit millionaire owners and builders.

eye-opening book about the benefits of cities

The book makes a compelling case for how cities
were, are and will be critical to the progress of humankind
and why and how we need to value and nurture cities
to continue to reap these benefits

Really enjoyable

The narrator was excellent, The book really opens your mind that urban living is sometimes better than rule living and over all has helped a lot and that the city's need to spend their money much better to actually help people and not places.

Soo good I read it twice

Thoroughly enjoyed these insights, so much so that I recently re-read the whole book.

Interesting histories, facts, and new ways of thinking about the cities we are in every day.

Great for entrepreneurs!

This is a great read for anyone related to real estate, developers, investors, politicians, and more. Check it out!

Great listen

Explains in layman's terms why cities matter, policies that help and hurt affordability, and the unintended consequences of the policies. Excellent narration.

This is a must for all environmentalists!

This is a book that deserves to be a staple on the shelves of all those calling themselves environmentalists, especially in the USA apparently.
I personally was born with an innate affection for the city life, but having explained in detail why living in the city is, and will be for the time being, the most logic AND "human" choice, and not by some journalist but by a scholar, is one of the great pleasures in life.
The book also opened a bunch of new ways of thinking about the city and introduced me to many new concepts.

Not recommended to hardcore NIMBYs, people who put anything, including animals, before the value of human life and welfare.