In 1974, people using subways and railroads in and around New York were still riding on tracks laid between 1904 and 1933

During the following decade —1955-1965 — federal and state governments spent on new highways in the metropolitan area — the new highways recommended in the Joint Program — about $1,200,000,000. They spent not a cent on mass transportation. ... During this decade [following], 439 miles of new highways were built - and not one mile of new railroad or subway. In 1974, people using subways and railroads in and around New York were still riding on tracks laid between 1904 and 1933, the last year before Robert Moses came to power in the city. Not a single mile had been built since.

R. Caro, The power broker (1974), 930

But all the highways and parks and bridges he had built were little more than nothing next to the highways and parks and bridges that Robert Moses wanted to build

Robert Moses had built public works on a scale unmatched by any other individual in the history of America. But all the highways and parks and bridges he had built were little more than nothing next to the highways and parks and bridges that Robert Moses wanted to build. ... After a decade and a half of building public works, the public works he has not yet built loomed before him larger than ever. 

R. Caro, The power broker (1974), 619

Planners in general, he said, are "socialists," "revolutionaries" who "do not reach the masses directly but through familiar subsurface activity"

Moses applied these labels generously, branding them not only onto labor leaders ("radical, left-wing") and New Deal Brain Trusters (Rexford Tugwell he assailed as a "Planning Red") and urban planners who dared to offer suggestions for the future of New York City ("regarded in Russia as our greatest builder," was how he characterised Frank Lloyd Wright; he called Lewis Mumford "an outspoken revolutionary"; Walter Gropius, he said, was seeking to change the American system by advocating "a philosophy which doesn't belong here"; planners in general, he said, are "socialists," "revolutionaries" who "do not reach the masses directly but through familiar subsurface activity ....) but onto youthful city officials who dared to stand up to him and who had, his bloodhounds discovered once allowed enthusiasm and naïveté to lead them into membership in some organization that they later learned was a Communist front.

R. Caro, The power broker (1974), 471

230,000 dead rats were counted in a single week at the zoo site alone

In Central Park, Moses' men restored Olmstead's long-defaced buildings, replanted the Shakespeare garden, placing next to every flower a quotation from the Bard in which it was mentioned, and exterminated herds of rats; 230,000 dead ones were counted in a single week at the zoo site alone. 

R. Caro, The power broker (1974), 374

Here we were on an absolutely deserted sand bar - there was no was even to get there but by boat - ... talking about bathhouses like palaces and parking lots that held ten thousand cars

One of the famous architects standing around Moses said, "Are you crazy?" The others knew what they architect meant. As one was later to put is: "It was the scale of the thing - nothing on a scale like this had ever been done in public recreation in America. Here we were on an absolutely deserted sand bar - there was no was even to get there but by boat - and here was this guy drawing X's on the back of an envelope and talking about bathhouses like palaces and parking lots that held ten thousand cars. Why, I don't think there was a parking lot of ten thousand cards anywhere in America. And landscaping? Landscaping on a sand bar? We weren't sure anything would grow on a sand bar. We thought he was nuts." 

R. Caro, The power broker (1974), 223

But free and open debate had not made his dreams come true.

Once, no reformer, no idealist, had believed more sincerely than he in free and open discussion. No reformer, no idealist, had argued more vigorously that legislative bills should be fully debated, and that the debates should be published so that the citizenry could be informed on the issues. 

But free and open debate had not made his dreams come true. Instead, politicians had crushed them. And now he was going to make sure that, with the exception of Al Smith and Belle Moskowitz, no one — not citizenry, not press, not Legislature — was going to know what was in the bills dealing with parks that the Legislature was going to pass. The best bill drafted in Albany set to work.

R. Caro, The power broker (1974), 173

Even personality must be reduced to a number

It was the proposal of a fanatic. John Calvin specifying permissible arrangements for women's hair in sixteenth-century Geneva was not more thorough than was Bob Moses enumerating the "functions" and "responsibilities" of New York's civil servants. No aspect of conduct on the job was too small to be graded. Even personality must be reduced to a number.

R. Caro, The power broker (1974),  75