It's reminiscent of Arcosanti in it's aim of transforming a harsh environment into somewhere livable, instead of just picking somewhere livable in the first pla

It's reminiscent of Arcosanti in it's aim of transforming a harsh environment into somewhere livable, instead of just picking somewhere livable in the first place. Maybe it's just pragmatic since arid land is the cheapest land, but it has a nice principal to it, of taking land and improving it instead of draining and farming everything out of it. I think Arcosanti has a second design advantage tho, it started with a small but livable urban core, so even with 50 residents the city is functional (given enough tourists) but the plans include expansions for 500 and then 5,000 residents. To grow the city as people show up seems like a better move then spending billions of dollars before you open the gates.