Reviews and Comments

An excellent book about how transportation policy had become so car-centric, and ways that we are moving away from that. What I liked most in the book were Schwartz's stories about his time as traffic commissioner in New York City, including his initial push to get congestion pricing implemented in New York City, which was not implemented at the time of writing, but is now, (and it only took fifteen years to get through!). I also really liked his story of how they got a new stadium built with minimal parking and made it work by placing it next to a metro stop and giving attendees free access to the metro along with their ticket. Schwartz also talks about the future of transportation in this book, which is kind of fun, but more speculative.

I enjoyed Frank McCourt's ability to relate his experience growing up in poverty in Ireland with a combination of empathy and humor, and while this is a memoir which seems to give in to artistic license at times, it was eye-opening to get a view into what that experience would have been like.

This book serves as an incredible point of reference for our current time, and gives a view into the political environment of the 1930s that gave rise to authoritarian governments in Europe, and might have in the U.S., too, despite the sentiment of many that "It Can't Happen Here".

This is a story that is well written and also carries a great message of the importance of not being complacent when witnessing the rise of authoritarianism in your own country.