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Eleven million tonnes of New York steam

The New York steam system is iconic – known from the big screen as much as from walking around Manhattan, but fewer people know how it works, or indeed what purpose it serves. To many people, this looks like mysterious gases escaping from the subterranean world of the sewers.
Weirdly alluring considering it’s just a stripey pipe with steam coming out of it, but here’s what the New York steam system sounds like!
City version:

The starting point for the reimagined piece is the mystery of the steam pipes, and trying to create a piece built around those sounds that feels subterranean, as if the music itself is escaping from a crack in the ground, and drifting around the night skies of Manhattan.

Best listened to on headphones, while walking around midtown Manhattan at 3am.

Memory version:

Check out the rest of our New York sounds on the New York sound map!