Devon Zuegel

And Las Catalinas has a really interesting model of development where they've decided that they're going to preserve 1,000 out of the 1,200 acres as natural rainforest. And then the remaining 200 acres will be developed into basically an Italian hill town on the side of the Costa Rican coast. So it's as beautiful as it sounds.

And Las Catalinas has a really interesting model of development where they've decided that they're going to preserve 1,000 out of the 1,200 acres as natural rainforest. And then the remaining 200 acres will be developed into basically an Italian hill town on the side of the Costa Rican coast. So it's as beautiful as it sounds.

Right now, they've developed 20 of the acres, which is not that much land. It's got about 200 homes and it's got 10 restaurants, a hotel. Something that's really striking about Las Catalinas is that in the 20 acres, it's completely car-free. In other parts of their development, they're going to have some car access. But in the first phase, it was completely car-free.

Right now, they've developed 20 of the acres, which is not that much land. It's got about 200 homes and it's got 10 restaurants, a hotel. Something that's really striking about Las Catalinas is that in the 20 acres, it's completely car-free. In other parts of their development, they're going to have some car access. But in the first phase, it was completely car-free.

And I went there thinking, how is this going to work? I don't really get it. But something magical happened when I was there, which is I realized that once you take cars fully out of the equation of a residential neighborhood, suddenly everything can be a lot closer together. Because I think Something most people don't realize is that cars take an incredible amount of space.

And I went there thinking, how is this going to work? I don't really get it. But something magical happened when I was there, which is I realized that once you take cars fully out of the equation of a residential neighborhood, suddenly everything can be a lot closer together. Because I think Something most people don't realize is that cars take an incredible amount of space.

I urge you next time you go outside to just look around and really think about how much space is devoted to cars and getting them around. Some of that space is totally warranted. I want emergency vehicles to be able to access my home if I have a problem and being able to drop off my groceries is really nice. There's a lot of really good use cases for cars, but it is a trade-off that we have made.

I urge you next time you go outside to just look around and really think about how much space is devoted to cars and getting them around. Some of that space is totally warranted. I want emergency vehicles to be able to access my home if I have a problem and being able to drop off my groceries is really nice. There's a lot of really good use cases for cars, but it is a trade-off that we have made.

And I think people are not often aware of that trade-off of just how much space is taken. And so Las Catalinas can fit a lot into 20 acres. 200 homes in usual American development would take multiples of that space usually when you have cars involved.

And I think people are not often aware of that trade-off of just how much space is taken. And so Las Catalinas can fit a lot into 20 acres. 200 homes in usual American development would take multiples of that space usually when you have cars involved.

And so just getting to experience what that was like and realize that I think we can push that idea farther of having more car-free or car-light spaces. I really like studying things that are extremes on a particular dimension because I think that you end up learning a lot about the limits of the system.

And so just getting to experience what that was like and realize that I think we can push that idea farther of having more car-free or car-light spaces. I really like studying things that are extremes on a particular dimension because I think that you end up learning a lot about the limits of the system.

And I expected to hit up against the limits of that system much sooner than the extreme that Las Catalinas took it to.

And I expected to hit up against the limits of that system much sooner than the extreme that Las Catalinas took it to.

I think it's really interesting to look at how cities across different places and times have developed based on different local constraints. Like historically, we've piled on a lot more rules over the years and over the centuries of how places get built. And it used to be that cities were much more developed by like an organic process.

I think it's really interesting to look at how cities across different places and times have developed based on different local constraints. Like historically, we've piled on a lot more rules over the years and over the centuries of how places get built. And it used to be that cities were much more developed by like an organic process.

So when you go to old towns in Europe or Asia or anywhere, places that were built hundreds of years ago, they tend to have more human scale winding streets. And it's almost more like a garden that's been left to overgrow, but it grows in interesting ways. And you can tell pretty quickly how planned a place has been.

So when you go to old towns in Europe or Asia or anywhere, places that were built hundreds of years ago, they tend to have more human scale winding streets. And it's almost more like a garden that's been left to overgrow, but it grows in interesting ways. And you can tell pretty quickly how planned a place has been.

And I think a shift that I've seen over time is it used to be that we wouldn't plan cities very much at all. And I had some real problems, especially as we started living more densely with each other. There would be more issues of cholera in the water system, which would kill a lot of people like real, real problems that precipitated more planning problems.

And I think a shift that I've seen over time is it used to be that we wouldn't plan cities very much at all. And I had some real problems, especially as we started living more densely with each other. There would be more issues of cholera in the water system, which would kill a lot of people like real, real problems that precipitated more planning problems.