基础设施观察

当我开始撰写关于使我们生活成为可能的基础设施系统的书《On the Grid》时,我将其设想为现代世界基础设施的彼得森指南。

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当我开始撰写《On the Grid》,这本关于使我们的生活成为可能的基础设施系统的书时,我曾把它想象成现代世界基础设施的彼得森指南。但它从未成为那样——首先,基础设施实在太多了,无法真正包含在一本叙事书中;其次,即使可以,我也无法理解你可能遇到的所有具体部分;第三,类似彼得森风格的袖珍指南已经以简略形式存在于《路边技术实地指南》中。

真正的问题是,每个系统都需要自己的指南。你可以为不同类型的电线杆制作一本指南;为废水处理的各种管道、泵站、处理设施和生物固体处理工艺制作另一本指南;再为供水系统的水塔、阀门和人孔制作一本指南。

然后你可以拥有这本:《集装箱指南》,作者蒂姆·黄和克雷格·坎农湾区基础设施观察站的创始人,正如其名:这是一个由公民组成的团体,致力于关注他们在旧金山湾区周围的基础设施,尽管他们对任何想向他们指出基础设施的地方都非常感兴趣。他们会参观当地的桥梁和处理厂等地。他们的网站上有来自法国的桥梁和来自冰岛的渔塘的照片,所以他们显然全身心投入到基础设施这件事中。当然,这对每个人来说都是好消息。


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《集装箱指南》是他们的第一本出版物,他们为此进行了一个完整的Kickstarter活动,该活动将在未来一两天内结束。当然,它已经超过了既定目标,因为本质上很酷的东西往往会这样做。坎农顺便说一句,曾是《洋葱报》的图形编辑,现在是Cultivated Wit(无限精彩的Fuck You Congress的幕后团队)的联合编辑。所以:很酷的家伙。

无论如何,《集装箱指南》将印在防撕裂和防水纸上,它将收录杰出的罗斯·乔治和其他酷人的文章,而且它不会很贵,如果你住在任何靠近港口航运业务类型的地方,以至于能够识别集装箱本身就显得很重要,那么你就需要拥有它。

另外:如果你在他们的 Kickstarter 活动中捐款 10,000 美元,你将获得大亨级别,除了你的《指南》副本外,他们还会送你一个你自己的二手集装箱,拜托。世界上还有比这更酷的事情吗?

为了一个每个人都关注他们基础设施的世界,致以问候。

 

 

Scott Huler was born in 1959 in Cleveland and raised in that city's eastern suburbs. He graduated from Washington University in 1981; he was made a member of Phi Beta Kappa because of the breadth of his studies, and that breadth has been a signature of his writing work. He has written on everything from the death penalty to bikini waxing, from NASCAR racing to the stealth bomber, for such newspapers as the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Philadelphia Inquirer, and the Los Angeles Times and such magazines as ESPN, Backpacker, and Fortune. His award-winning radio work has been heard on "All Things Considered" and "Day to Day" on National Public Radio and on "Marketplace" and "Splendid Table" on American Public Media. He has been a staff writer for the Philadelphia Daily News and the Raleigh News & Observer and a staff reporter and producer for Nashville Public Radio. He was the founding and managing editor of the Nashville City Paper. He has taught at such colleges as Berry College and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

His books include Defining the Wind, about the Beaufort Scale of wind force, and No-Man's Lands, about retracing the journey of Odysseus.

His most recent book, On the Grid, was his sixth. His work has been included in such compilations as Appalachian Adventure and in such anthologies as Literary Trails of the North Carolina Piedmont, The Appalachian Trail Reader and Speed: Stories of Survival from Behind the Wheel.

For 2014-2015 Scott is a Knight Science Journalism Fellow at MIT, which is funding his work on the Lawson Trek, an effort to retrace the journey of explorer John Lawson through the Carolinas in 1700-1701.

He lives in Raleigh, North Carolina, with his wife, the writer June Spence, and their two sons.

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