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Comment by webmobdev | Hacker News Reader

There are already so many dying or dead towns / cities in the US that building a new city in a desert sounds like thoughtless, careless waste (not to mention the ecological disaster of displacing / destroying the ecosystem of the desert). When there are so many habitable locations, why build a city in an inhospitable environment - so much energy resource is going to be wasted to make it habitable ...

- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ghost_towns_in_the_Uni...

- https://www.businessinsider.com/10-american-cities-that-are-...

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This new city most likely depends on getting necessary regulatory and code approvals that would be impossible elsewhere. There's also a reason why towns become ghost towns, and the investors putting in $400B in funding probably don't want to start with one foot in the metaphorical grave.

From the sound of it, he’s still looking for all of the “investors putting in $400B of funding” at this point. For now, it seems he’s just doing PR and paying an architecture firm to make 3D renders.

To me the set of issues that come with building up a pre-existing city/town are similar to those faced by companies and municipalities looking to lay fiberoptic cable for internet service: endless political hurdles and obstructionism coming from the numerous groups and individuals involved, slowing development to a crawl or stopping it altogether.

It's no wonder why this project is pursuing a "clean slate" approach.

If they tried to rebuild a functional modern city in an existing dying city it would be called gentrification and vilified by the current occupants.

Because trying out new political structures that is the reason for building the new city. Nevada has passed a law recently that allows for basically the creation of new counties within existing ones. The county level is where quite a bit of political power lies, even though that level of government is often forgotten. Who knows what might come out of it, but I would like to see someone give it a try.

According to the article Appalachia is also under consideration, which I guess would alleviate the water concerns. The only justification I can think of for a project like this is BANANAs making the reformation of current cities impossible. But I share your skepticism. But it's always nice to see cool architectural mockups!

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