"McShane argues that U.S. automobile technology emerged at the turn of the century because American urban culture had changed (not because of the refinement of internal combustion engines in the late 1890s). . . . He traces pre-automobile modes of transportation from the beginnings of the automobile's development through its rapid growth."

--Library Journal

Columbia University Press Web Site, May, 2000

McShane examines the uniquely American relation between auto-mobility and urbanization.Deftly combining urban and technological history, McShane focuses on how new transportation systems--most important, the private automobile--and new concepts of the city redefined each other in modern America.