5 ms·

Have we considered just building new cities? It would be cool if the state could run a contest, have a rural county sign up to reform their zoning laws, and in

Have we considered just building new cities? It would be cool if the state could run a contest, have a rural county sign up to reform their zoning laws, and in exchange receive 100 year tax relief guarantees from the state to build a new city. America used to build new cities from scratch all the time up until WW2. This creates competition between cities (new entrants) resulting in better policies all around. And the best part is it results in more empty land becoming valuable, enabling either dense or suburban housing as desired (hopefully making it non partisan). Seems to me primary barrier today is there’s no unincorporated land left in the US, so let’s create a system for allowing new incorporations to emerge somehow!

bobthepanda 4y ago
Most cities are where they are because all the good spots have been taken. Any new significant city will need billions if not tens of billions of dollars on transport links, water, sewer, etc, if there is even a way to bring a city sized amount of potable water. And then you have to convince people to actually move their residences and jobs there. Most people don‘t like betting uprooting their whole family and social lives on a total unknown. History is littered of examples of new failed cities that in the best case scenario became really far bedroom communities, or in the worst case didn‘t get off the ground.
- soared 4y ago
  Cities are where good spots were x years ago, where x is somewhere between 300 and 100. The world is different with transportation/etc and the good spots don't look the same. See the flood of people to small mountain towns during covid. They weren't the best places before because they were hard to get to and from, but with highways, small airports, fiber internet, etc they are in many ways better than cities. With enough investment in new roads and infrastructure we could easily build a huge city in Summit County, Colorado.
  - bobthepanda 4y ago
    By definition, the carrying capacity of a small mountain town, is small. Summit County is currently in drought. Where is more potable water for more residents going to come from? (That‘s a pretty big problem in most of the West as drought conditions show no sign of improvement.) The cities are located where they are, because barring major changes transport costs going from cheapest to most expensive are navigable waterways > rail > road > air. Flying out of small airports is pretty expensive and not something that most Americans can afford to do regularly.
carabiner 4y ago
Of course, and they failed. See the huge empty tracts in places like California City and Merced.
- namlem 4y ago
  Not all of them failed. Las Vegas succeeded for example.
colinmhayes 4y ago
I wouldn't be surprised if Musk tries this. Seems like there's some land in Idaho or around that part that he could move all his companies to and his cult of personality might follow.
- JasserInicide 4y ago
  That sounds nice, but I have 0 faith in any of the big entrepreneurs out there to successfully run this. It will end up like that one Disney-run town in the 90s: corners cut everywhere, residents with 0 representation, just a mess all around. The fact remains is any company making a town/city will want a tangible return on it, and that fundamentally conflicts with how a municipal government is ran.
  - colinmhayes 4y ago
    I don't think the company would try to create the town, they'd just start building office space and hiring people to move there. Then the town would grow around them.
namlem 4y ago
How would people get to work? If you have a new city, there are going to very few employers due to a lack of workers, and therefore few residents, due to a lack of employers. People who WFH can live anywhere, why would they move to an empty city? If we want new cities to be built, what is needed is high capacity rapid transit. For example, build a high speed rail line from Chicago to St. Louis, and watch as the small towns in between become cities.
francisofascii 4y ago
You don't even need to build a new city, you just need to take an existing rust belt city and make it a cool place to live again. Gentrification, but instead of just a neighborhood, it would be with an entire metro area. Pittsburgh might be a recent example of this.

bobthepanda 4y ago

Most cities are where they are because all the good spots have been taken. Any new significant city will need billions if not tens of billions of dollars on transport links, water, sewer, etc, if there is even a way to bring a city sized amount of potable water. And then you have to convince people to actually move their residences and jobs there. Most people don‘t like betting uprooting their whole family and social lives on a total unknown. History is littered of examples of new failed cities that in the best case scenario became really far bedroom communities, or in the worst case didn‘t get off the ground.

soared 4y ago
Cities are where good spots were x years ago, where x is somewhere between 300 and 100. The world is different with transportation/etc and the good spots don't look the same. See the flood of people to small mountain towns during covid. They weren't the best places before because they were hard to get to and from, but with highways, small airports, fiber internet, etc they are in many ways better than cities. With enough investment in new roads and infrastructure we could easily build a huge city in Summit County, Colorado.
- bobthepanda 4y ago
  By definition, the carrying capacity of a small mountain town, is small. Summit County is currently in drought. Where is more potable water for more residents going to come from? (That‘s a pretty big problem in most of the West as drought conditions show no sign of improvement.) The cities are located where they are, because barring major changes transport costs going from cheapest to most expensive are navigable waterways > rail > road > air. Flying out of small airports is pretty expensive and not something that most Americans can afford to do regularly.

carabiner 4y ago

Of course, and they failed. See the huge empty tracts in places like California City and Merced.

namlem 4y ago
Not all of them failed. Las Vegas succeeded for example.

colinmhayes 4y ago

I wouldn't be surprised if Musk tries this. Seems like there's some land in Idaho or around that part that he could move all his companies to and his cult of personality might follow.

JasserInicide 4y ago
That sounds nice, but I have 0 faith in any of the big entrepreneurs out there to successfully run this. It will end up like that one Disney-run town in the 90s: corners cut everywhere, residents with 0 representation, just a mess all around. The fact remains is any company making a town/city will want a tangible return on it, and that fundamentally conflicts with how a municipal government is ran.
- colinmhayes 4y ago
  I don't think the company would try to create the town, they'd just start building office space and hiring people to move there. Then the town would grow around them.

namlem 4y ago

How would people get to work? If you have a new city, there are going to very few employers due to a lack of workers, and therefore few residents, due to a lack of employers. People who WFH can live anywhere, why would they move to an empty city? If we want new cities to be built, what is needed is high capacity rapid transit. For example, build a high speed rail line from Chicago to St. Louis, and watch as the small towns in between become cities.

francisofascii 4y ago

You don't even need to build a new city, you just need to take an existing rust belt city and make it a cool place to live again. Gentrification, but instead of just a neighborhood, it would be with an entire metro area. Pittsburgh might be a recent example of this.