Books

Megaprojects

Bent Flyvbjerg | 2023 | ★★☆☆☆
Read: March 15, 2026

The core message is to reduce risks that may produce tail events. The example around hiring every single archaeologist in Britain for HS2 is great, but then Flyvbjerg lacks a wider description of why HS2 is still ongoing, since it clearly has been a planning disaster (is it bat tunnels and stone-skipping bridges?). Other notes around projects which are one-of or first-of are great, but I would rather a book that explores a single project in great depth rather than jumping across examples whether they are the despair of the architect of the Sydney Opera House or a couple in Brooklyn. I did use the advice around understanding expected costs for the median project of that type to plan for my loft conversion but the part I do have expertise in: planning software projects, and seeing how Flyvbjerg treated that, made me skeptical of the remainder of the claims.