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Has anyone ever considered moving to some wilderness and just developing an urban center there, a la Sim City? If there's such a shortage of cities, perhaps bui
by padobson 8y ago
Has anyone ever considered moving to some wilderness and just developing an urban center there, a la Sim City? If there's such a shortage of cities, perhaps building one from scratch is a viable option.
- forgotmysn 8y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fordl%C3%A2ndia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fordl%C3%A2ndia
- carapace 8y agoThat is incredible.
- padobson 8y agoGreat reference! I seem to remember some old computer game, I think it was Amazon Trail 3[0], in which there was a side quest where you had to trade rubber for other items while near Fordlandia. [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_Trail_3rd_Edition https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_Trail_3rd_Edition
- konschubert 8y agoI think this has been done many times in human history. Sometimes with success, usually with failure. But considering the shortage of cities, maybe it is actually time for another success story?
- droidist2 8y agoNot wilderness, but a city from scratch (Songdo, South Korea): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Songdo_International_Business_District https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Songdo_International_Business_...
- twic 8y agoIt's been done in various ways. Brasilia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bras%C3%ADlia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bras%C3%ADlia England's garden cities: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garden_city_movement https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garden_city_movement And later the New Towns: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_towns_movement https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_towns_movement I'm would guess there are examples from the former communist bloc, but i'm not familiar with them. Would Magnitogorsk count?
- cmurphycode 8y agoFor an interesting take on this, read about https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rajneeshpuram https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rajneeshpuram and consider watching the documentary "Wild Wild Country" on Netflix. I thought it was fascinating.
- scythe 8y agoAt least seven examples have been mentioned so far, but I'm shocked that the most prominent such city, by far, is missing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington,_D.C.#Foundation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington,_D.C.#Foundation
- TheCoelacanth 8y agoDC was not by any stretch of the imagination founded in the wilderness. Alexandria was the 22nd largest city in the country at the time its location was chosen and Georgetown was only a bit smaller. DC contained both.
- xvedejas 8y agoOthers have pointed out that this has happened, with cities like DC and Brasilia, but I have yet to see an example of a new city that wasn't built in a car-oriented way. If you want a fundamentally walkable city, you have to make some decisions that hurt car drivers, and I don't think anyone has been willing to do so with these projects.
- konschubert 8y agoI would be willing :p
- TheCoelacanth 8y agoDC was not created in the middle of the wilderness. Alexandria was the the 22nd largest city in the country at the time DC's location was chosen and Georgetown was only a bit smaller.
- kbob 8y agoDC was founded and laid out about a century before the automobile was invented. I don't think you can say it was designed for cars.
- pc2g4d 8y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salt_Lake_City https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salt_Lake_City
- saalweachter 8y agoI mean, you can, but you need to start from a relatively powerful position. While cities frequently arise organically, they do exist for reasons. People move to cities for opportunity. Opportunity to find work is the most common one, but other ones crop up. Opportunity to meet people; opportunity to produce or consume the finer arts. Educational opportunities, for themselves or their children. Opportunities for freedom of some kind, religious, sexual, literal. So if you want to build a new city, you have to ask yourself, what opportunities can we create for people, to inspire them to move here? You don't have to provide all the opportunities - once you have a critical mass of people they'll create new opportunities themselves to pull in more people - but to get the ball rolling you need to create some core opportunity that is great enough to pull in that initial critical mass of people. Historically this has happened most often through industry. You go to a small nothing of a town, open a new factory that employs thousands of people, and it turns into a city.
- nanomonkey 8y agoWhy start from scratch? Why not take over an existing town with some infrastructure which has been mostly abandoned? There are plenty of small towns in Northern California, say Corning, that were once large productive communities in the past that could be revitalized and modernized. One could purchased 5 homes for the price of a house in the Bay Area.
- dredmorbius 8y agoWilderness is, in general, a poor place to build a city. Though it's happened. Brasilia, Phoenix, Las Vegas, Salt Lake City, Dubai, all come to mind. Each has major issues and limitations. Historically, cities have been established near productive capacity, transport (nearly always water), and with local sources of essentials, especially food and water. It's possible to violate these norms, but incredibly expensive, long term, to do so.