There have been other stories of "ghost towns" which eventually filled up with people. Perhaps this is just one of those. I always find it fascinating but I also note that a major disaster in a city like Beijing and there is already a bunch of places to house people post disaster. I don't know if anyone else thinks about it in that way but from a civil defense perspective it seems interesting to have "back up" cities waiting.

For other Person of Interest fans I found that Ordos was a ghost town interesting from that aspect of things as well.