Sybil Derrible grew up in a place I had never heard of before. A tiny French island off the coast of Newfoundland. That place, as well as decades of training as an engineer, and exploration of many cities in the world left him with a passion for infrastructure.
Huh. A passion for infrastructure. This I can relate to. Once I learned about commercial real estate, I became fascinated with learning who owned the mall, or the grocery store, or all the other places I visited on a regular basis. When I started investing, I started finding investable companies everywhere. The boring companies, the ones that make dental equipment or elevator screws or air conditioner parts, are some of the most solid and reliable places to put your money.
The Infrastructure Book: How Cities Work And Power Our Lives is a meditation on infrastructure that awakened my curiosity about how the services I rely on truly function. Derrible takes us from Roman aqueducts to desalination plants in Israel to power grids and natural gas pipelines all to discover how things work and how they could work. Along the way you learn terms like flocculation, but none of it feels like work because Derrible’s desire to have us truly understand carries the book forward.
I find I learn the most from people who care greatly about what they study. That comes through in both the book and this interview.
This interview was done as part of the New Books Network, a fantastic podcast platform that features dozens of author interviews with leading academics and thoughtleaders each week.
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