In the Mojave Desert you’ll find California City, a city famous for dreaming big. A huge chunk of it is gridded roads—complete with names, speed limits, and GPS driving directions—with nothing built on the vast majority of those plots.
Incorporated in 1965, California City is a living contradiction. Today it’s a working community with roughly 15,000 residents. But it’s simultaneously enormous, having been planned at a scale to rival Los Angeles. The city has over 200 square miles of land, planned by Nat Mendelsohn as a model city.
In this mini-documentary, Tom Scott visits California City and interviews various city officials. He digs into the city’s storied past, and shows us both what is there and what is not. The city is physically enormous, so it’s certainly possible that one day it will grow to meet its original plan. It might just take a few centuries.
Have a look at the third-largest city in California (by land area, anyway):
Related is this behind-the-scenes video in which Scott explains why he’s interested in California City:
October 9, 2016 – 12:00pm