Cities and Their Vital Systems asks basic questions about the longevity, utility, and nature of urban infrastructures; analyzes how they grow, interact, and change; and asks how, when, and at what cost they should be replaced. Among the topics discussed are problems arising from increasing air travel and airport congestion; the adequacy of water supplies and waste treatment; the impact of new technologies on construction; urban real estate values; and the field of "telematics," the combination of computers and telecommunications that makes money machines and national newspapers possible.

This book, first published in 1995, describes how automation is changing the face of acquisitions as librarians know it and making the future uncertain yet exciting. It documents how libraries have increasingly moved to powerful, second-generation interfaceable or integrated systems that can control all aspects of library operations. The libraries presented as examples show that increasing user expectations, the siren call of cyberspace and network connectivity, and administrative faith in the savings to be obtained from electronic technical services continue to drive the migration to higher-level library management systems.