Infrastructure and Culture: A Vital Connection

For the second episode of the Culture Study podcast, we’re diving into the nerdy and awesome and frustrating world of the infrastructure that surrounds us. Why are sidewalks so bad in so many places? How do we undo car dependencies? What’s the deal with a power company in Vermont distributing a huge battery to every customer? What are we going to do about all these ready-to-fail water treatment plants? If we can have air conditioners in our STEERING WHEELS why can’t we have good trains?

Deb Chachra, author of How Infrastructure Works, joins the pod to talk about the wild and fascinating systems that shape our world. Also: septic systems.

This is the podcast version of a "just trust me," so even if you don’t think you’re an infrastructure nerd, you’re going to love it. I love it enough to release it ahead of next week’s Taylor Swift deep dive and the following week’s deeply funny episode about Paw Patrol, so that’s saying something.

Show notes:

• Deb’s book How Infrastructure Works!!!!

• Deb’s colleague Dr. Allison Wood, who did her PhD work on neighborhood scale septic systems

• Just a neat engraving of 19th century sewage treatment construction (via Getty, exact date unknown)

• Henry Graber’s book on sidewalks and parking, Paved Paradise

• The “term of art” Deb and I were looking for re: wide roads with tons of lanes that are the deadliest in the U.S.: STROADS

• The problem with curb cuts & accessibility

• The “micro metro” system in Los Angeles (like an Uber bus, sort of)

• The cool Vermont utility program to distribute big batteries

• The new Lummi Island electric ferry!!!!

• Amartya Sen’s canonical lecture “Equality of What?” and the argument, as Deb puts it, that “wealth is a way of providing us the freedom to live the kinds of lives that we have reason to value”

• Here’s a link to Deb’s newsletter, METAFOUNDRY

• My introduction to Deb’s writing: “Care at Scale: Bodies, Agency, Infrastructure,” from Comment (a past Culture Study just trust me!)

This week, we’re looking for your questions for future episodes about:

• We could still use a few questions re: The Mean Girls Trailer!!!

• Celebrity Philanthropies (weird ones, good ones, why do they exist, etc.)

• “Little treat” culture

• Cold Plunging

• Moms for Liberty

• Very Contemporary Architecture Trends (like ‘modern farmhouse’)

• You can submit them (and ideas for future eps) here.

Now come hang out with us in the discussion — a few ideas to get us started:

• What’s an impressive piece of infrastructure from your daily life?

• What piece of infrastructure (in your daily life or just generally) do you think is totally underrated and deserves daily celebration?

• Just a thought experiment in line with Deb’s thinking… I’m often pretty pessimistic about our ability to accomplish big infrastructure projects in the U.S. Take one that usually makes you say “that’ll never happen”… what would be possible if it COULD and DID happen? What would it allow?

• What infrastructure questions do you STILL have?

• OR ANYTHING ELSE YOU WANT TO TALK ABOUT FROM THIS EPISODE!!