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How Big Things Get Done
Book

How Big Things Get Done

The Surprising Factors That Determine the Fate of Every Project, from Home Renovations to Space Exploration and Everything In Between

Bent Flyvbjerg and Dan Gardner
Crown, 2023
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In this fascinating tour of flops and triumphs, megaproject expert Bent Flyvbjerg and journalist Dan Gardner delve into what went wrong — and right — in the planning and execution of a variety of projects. They lay out why the Guggenheim Bilbao came off flawlessly while the Sydney Opera House and California’s high-speed rail faced cost overruns. The book expands into other types of projects, too. Why did author Robert Caro take seven times as long as he expected to complete The Power Broker? And how on earth did Jimi Hendrix’s studio in Greenwich Village get built with no plan or budget? 

Summary

Megaprojects happen more quickly if everyone slows down during the planning process.

Big infrastructure projects are nearly synonymous with cost overruns and construction delays. Whether the project is the Holland Tunnel in New York City, the Channel Tunnel connecting France and the UK or the Great Belt bridges and tunnel in Denmark, costly mishaps abound. The Great Belt project went sideways in the late 1980s when workers building a suspension bridge unwittingly breached the undersea rail tunnel, causing a devastating flood. Flyvbjerg’s yearslong research project found that hundreds of megaprojects completed from 1910 to 1998 underestimated costs by an average of 28%. Even megaprojects in Germany and Switzerland — nations lauded for their precision and organization — failed to finish on schedule or within budget.

Hasty construction work mars nearly all failed megaprojects. The scenario is familiar: The project grabs headlines, and those leading the way do not want to be embarrassed by missing the deadline. So, they push workers to move quickly. The Copenhagen Opera House offers one such example – the architect, Henning Larsen, was so ...

About the Authors

Bent Flyvbjerg is a professor at the University of Oxford and at the IT University of Copenhagen. He has been called “the world’s leading megaproject expert.” Dan Gardner is a journalist and the best-selling author of Risk and Future Babble.

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