Exploring the Hidden Infrastructure Beneath New York City Streets
What's Under Your Feet in New York City?
I take you on a tour beneath Manhattan to reveal the massive root system of water and power that keeps the city running. We examine why water mains run at high pressure to prevent contamination and how New York's unique underground electrical networks differ from standard radial systems. From gravity-fed water sources to submerged transformers, this hidden world is essential for the city's daily survival.
You want any crack, hole, or break in a water main to be a one-way street; if anything is moving from one side of the pipe wall to the other, it is pretty important that it happens from in to out.
- evrydayhustling
Around 2012 I was working near 5th Ave and 14th st, and there was a giant water main break. They had to dig about three stories down in a large intersection, and you could walk near the edge and look in.
It was extraordinary, like something out of a sci-fi where an alien ship has been torn open and the mess of pipes and wires looks organic. It was also a funny case of lost tech / organizational memory -- I heard they had to ask the union to help find retired folks who had worked on the lower levels and could explain why pipes were laid out the way they were.
- mike_hock
That's where the mutants live. Also, there's a thousand year old, old New York City buried underneath that had bathroom booths with phones in them.
- xg15
Still waiting for someone to resurrect that old pneumatic tube system...
- hotstickyballs
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City_synagogue_tunnel...
- radicality
This is quite informative and useful as I live in NYC. I think in the video he mentioned that the city is collecting all that data on what’s underground to collect all in a database and make repairs easier - anyone know if such data is or will be public, like on data.ny.gov ?
And what I’m getting at, is it would be really cool to have this kind of 3d visualization like in the video, but based on actual real data so I could view what’s actually underneath the streets I walk every day.