Yahoo Images
I recently read London Under: The Secret History Under the Streets by esteemed author Peter Ackroyd. I’m not going to do a full review, but I will say that this book was a fascinating account of life under the streets of London — the sewers, the Tube tunnels, the buried rivers, and more. If you’re at all interested in London or urban history, I encourage you to read it.
As you can imagine, a city as old as London has a whole lot going on under the streets and buildings. (I mean, hellooooooo, Richard III!) The London Tube system is the oldest subway in the world and some of the lines in use have been around well over century.
The sewers also have their tales, but one thing that grabbed my attention and then led to a meandering internet search was a brief mention of modern sewer workers having to scrape the tunnels clean of, ahem, deposits (but not the kind you’re thinking of), kind of like a great big urban cesspool angioplasty. National Geographic also has an interesting article (with photos) of the process.
This is just one of many reasons why I puffyheart the internet: I can research anything, ANYTHING, that comes to mind and then find even more utterly captivating articles to read and photos to study.
What’s the most interesting thing you’ve read online recently?
`
I love doing a little bit of research to debunk false rumors, like Morgan Freeman’s death.
There’s that facebook post going around…you know, the Dear Friends I’d like to keep things private one… and the advice it gives doesn’t actually solve the problem. With only a few seconds of research, I was able to find this: http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2011/09/26/facebook-ticker-privacy-scare/
which really explains what’s happening.
Ever since I saw this title on GoodReads (complements of vous), I’ve been jonesing to read it.
Have you met the 100 Hour Board? You can ask an anonymous question about anything ever in the whole world and a group of anonymous volunteer BYU students will find the answer within or around 100 hours. It’s fascinating and I’ve been reading through the archives and learning all sorts of useless trivia, trufax, and advice. (Here’s my most recent question, which will link you to the board in general http://theboard.byu.edu/questions/68899/ )
We made a beeline for the sewer museum in Paris because we, too, are interested in the really weird stuff like that.
Kris that’s a wonderful idea. I will book mark that site.
Jen, when we were in London 2 summers ago we learned about the old hydraulic power stations, which used to pump water through pipes to distant sites around the city to power things like elevators. It was fascinating.