In theory it’s a good idea, but sounds inefficient to me.
Maintaining the road, water and electricity grid over 50 square miles with 20% population costs 5x as much as maintaining 10 SM fully populated.
Instead of having a sparsely populated “city” of large geographical area, it would make a lot more sense to abandon entire areas and return it to agriculture and create a much smaller but still densely populated city.
I’m sure it’s inefficient, short term.
I’m banking on free-market capitalism and entrepreneurs. This is a concept that truly needs to be introduced in these decaying urban areas, like Detroit & my beloved hometown of Cleveland. Too many big unions, too much dependency, too much LIBERALISM, have killed off these places. I’m hoping a return to first principles sparks a new day.
Perhaps, once there are enough “farmers” someone will acquire the capital to put up a farmers market. And the locals who still want to make deliveries can still do so. That means someone will not only need an extra truck but some auto place to service that truck! Hopefully, they buy gas from a local station. Maybe a cooking school will spring up. Or maybe young people will begin to become interested in this stuff again; most kids have no idea what real food is or where it comes from.
I’m always trying to walk on the sunny side of the street. :)
I thought the police/fire were encouraging them to move the remaining population into a more compact, manageable area (and that the city intended to do this).