Our Pick
Posted on @rawstates
Cape Coral, the great swampland sales job
1957
Cape Coral, Florida
David Wilson · CC BY 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Two Baltimore brothers bought a hundred square miles of scrub in 1957 and sold it by mail and dinner-party pitch, lot by installment lot, flying prospects over the dredges for free. They dug 400 miles of canals, more than any city on earth, so every lot could claim waterfront. The environmental bill is still being paid, the burrowing owls colonised the empty lots, and the scheme is now Florida's biggest city between Tampa and Miami.
That was 1 of the hidden places.
Location: city-level
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