Breaking Up Cities

From an article in yesterday's New York Times about St. Louis:

Law enforcement officials, politicians and historic preservationists here have concluded that brick thieves are often to blame (for house fires in St. Louis), deliberately torching buildings to quicken their harvest of St. Louis brick, prized by developers throughout the South for its distinctive character.

"The firemen come and hose them down and shoot all that mortar off with the high-pressure hose," said Alderman Samuel Moore...