The High Line

"Imagine a very different New York City-one whose streets are filled with horses and buggies and people on foot. Now imagine that vehicles that shared the road-block-long freight trains trying to deliver goods to the west-side factories. How did New York in the 1800s solve the problem of trains barreling through busy city streets? They built the High Line. But the High Line's story doesn't end there. Once cars became common, innovative New Yorkers began to find and fight for new ways to breathe life into the old, raised train tracks. Since it opened as a 1.45-mile-long park in 2009, the High Line has become an iconic, must-see attraction and a marvel of landscape architecture admired worldwide for its history, beauty, and creative union of urban design with greenspace. As one of the best (and most unique) ways to view the NYC cityscape, it is a major tourist destination and its influence has been global; it was a pioneer in elevated parks, inspiring innovative infrastructure re-use projects around the world. But as the community changed rapidly over the years, longtime residents needed the park to still feel like their home, and they came up with ideas for how the High Line could make not only a global impact, but also help their local neighborhoods. Packed with historical information, gorgeously illustrated, and full of wonder, this nonfiction picture book from author-illustrator Victoria Tentler-Krylov is also a story of the people of New York City, from the imagination and ingenuity of architects and city planners who first built the High Line for the needs of industry, to those who reinvented the High Line for art, recreation, and preservation of nature"--