The city as playground.

• Author: Doherty, Brian
• Position: Briefly Noted - 'Hidden Cities' - Brief article - Book review

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Moses Gates is a professor of demography at Pratt Institute. As he reveals in Hidden Cities (Tarcher/Penguin), he's also a man with complicated experiences exploring urban spaces from New York to Paris to Sao Paulo to Odessa. His passion: places people aren't meant to go. He prefers the physically dangerous and legally dubious--down sewer and subway tunnels, up bridges and cathedrals.

Hidden Cities provides a compelling introduction into this international brotherhood of adventurers, though Gates'...