Real Life Game: The Entire Phoenix Valley
The reason why we are beginning in Phoenix isn’t because I found buildings that reminded me of videogames. No, it isn’t a single place. It is the entire Phoenix Valley!
This mild mannered area covers several cities, and millions of people in the middle of (no where) the desert. This shot is way too far out to really see what makes Phoenix a videogame. If we go a little closer, we can see the truth.
Look at the placement of the roads, and how the buildings are positioned, does it look familiar? To give you an idea, how about a shot of what this would look like in a game.
Yes, thats right, Phoenix is built exactly like Sim City. It goes from every building, to every block in a grid pattern, and looking at it from a plane will make your jaw drop. There is just a never ending grid pattern of one giant game. It has been played for decades, and few people know when it will ever see an attacking monster, or tornado.
The reason for this grid is from Mormon history. When the Mormons arrived in the Rocky Mountains, the need for places to stay became priority. Brigham Young -the leader of the church at the time- planned out all of Salt Lake City, and any other city that Mormons would live in. This includes cities such as Las Vegas, and Phoenix. The grid pattern was the system used for every block.
The way things are designed within Sim City is by placing areas sections off for various things. This part of the area will be housing, and this part will be for offices, and this part is industry. The same thing works within the entire Phoenix Valley.
This is the area around the West Creek Apartments, and also where I lived for most of the time I was in Phoenix. Each big road is one mile distance away from each other. The big thing in the center is the floodway in case of heavy rains. What you can see is that there are areas designated specifically for Commerce, and areas specifically for housing. There are schools, and parks at an even pace from each other as well. This was all decided on before any house went up.
In fact, one of the strangest experiences I can describe has happened while visiting Phoenix. It was in the North near the Deer Valley area, and had hundreds of thousands of homes built and ready to be lived in. The housing market had just gone under, so the entire area I drove through had no one living in it. There was a shopping district with a single Safeway in it. It was the nicest ghost town I have ever seen.
I wouldn’t be able to find the area because it has been rebuilt, but this is a general idea. If you look, there are spots that seem unused, just like in Sim City. The answer is even weirder. When a mall, or major area goes under, they tear it down, and leave the entire area desolate. This means that much of the valley is covered in giant barrent areas that used to be malls, and schools.
What you are looking at is not a barren field that is the end of the city. There are still numberless houses surrounding this dirt field. It went under, and is now just a dirt field. Dr. Wright would tell you to increase the commercial districts, and you would know where he was talking about, because of the giant dirt field. In other words, even from the ground it feels like someone is playing Sim City.
Wait, it gets better. Remember how the Phoenix Valley is actually several cities? Well, it works exactly like Sim City 4 other cities. There were separate cities that slowly merged, and because they were all based on a grid system, they all matched up perfectly. It gets even cooler when you realize that cities like Tempe are landlocked, and can’t grow anymore. The other cities surround it.
When I first saw Phoenix, I was on a plane trip, and surrounded by a small group I knew. Laid out in a perfect grid was the city, with houses going on forever. Without thinking, I remarked that it looked like Sim City. An associate from Tacoma -who was as you can guess was a bit of a moron- said I should be used to it since I was from Seattle. If you ever wonder why Tacoma is the butt of a lot of jokes in the Puget Sound, now you know. The idea of a city being built just like the games I used to play on the PC, and the Super Nintendo was amazing. If you are ever in the Phoenix area, and feel lost, remember, all major roads are a mile apart, and everything is built on a grid. The worst problem you have to deal with is when it floods. So far, no Godzilla attacks.
