His arcology sketchs was fittingly published in a huge 19x12 book. My university archive had an even more version, maybe 30 inches+ in the oversize department. I got to reference it for research, good times.

In the early 80's, on the second floor of the memorial union building at ASU they had a number of his drawings hung in frames on the wall. These were fairly large, 20-30 inches on a side. His vision, based on the drawings, was to have cities made of a large structure that combined living, work, recreation, shopping and whatever else, in a dense stack which minimized the impact on the surrounding land (at least from the city itself, not whatever agriculture was needed to support the city.) In looking through the Arcology, Soleri and Arcosanti wikipedia pages I see nothing like the drawings I saw at ASU. Today's Arcosanti is just a fraction of the completed structure which, if I remember correctly, was to span the valley that Arcosanti is on the edge of.

Soleri was also a weird, creepy person. Years later his daughter found the courage to denounce his abuses: https://www.google.nl/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/artanddesign...

It is entirely possible that these traits of Soleri are at the root of the stagnation of Arcosanti

Not his creepy traits per se, but certainly Paolo's ego impeded Arcosanti's development. Typical Founder's Syndrome: a general unwillingness to take on external ideas and relinquish control. When challenged, he would often tell people to get their own mesa and build their own arcology. This was always said with a smile and a laugh, but also, he meant it.

This was a huge problem. If there's any one thing which defines "what a city is", it's that it arises from a multiplicity of visions, not from a singular ideal. And Arcosanti needed multiple visions, because Soleri's vision was certainly incomplete. His understanding of economics, for example, was not just naive, but nonexistent.

Source: I lived at Arcosanti for 5 years in the mid 90s, and knew Paolo well.

Edit: but perhaps you're right, and there's some root psychological defect which manifests as both egotism and sexual abuse.

Thanks for your first-hand account, indeed all these personality disorders summed up can explain the reckless courage and egotism that made Soleri do and undo. Tragic

it would have been self-sustainable. If there was any water there.

Water isn't a problem there. They've got wells tapping into the Agua Fria river, which is half a mile away. Its subsurface flow makes it the third largest river in the state.

They are big on water re-use, greywater and such. The arcology idea is islands of self container cities that are self sustainable isolated ecosystems that recycle water etc. These are islands in a new wilderness around. Some arcologies are in space, some are in jungles, some in deserts. Like noas ark.

However much i like the visuals of solieris vision, concrete, hippie and brutalist architecture in general, i find the idea of life a city that cannot grow but inwards pretty grim.

Well, water is relatively cheap, if your "community" can produce and sell high-value stuff, like "art". They sell bells, for example [0].

Not enough, I'd guess, but you could afford basic water and food if you can sell something else at a high enough price.

[0]: https://cosanti.com/

or commerce

There's a limit to how many ceramic and brass bells they can sell, and compared to a local college/University it is not very accessible for their paid workshops.

Getting to self sustainability always suffers from bootstrap problems, and closed loop living systems of this sort, even at 5,000 people, would suffer from lack of domain expertise or specialized resources to be truly self sustainable. At least unless they either target a low technological level of life or pick the exact 5,000 people needed to keep things going.

That's not meant to be a criticism of this project. If anything the project has strong value in helping to understand roadblocks to small self-sustaining communities, while also contributing to the zeitgeist of fascinating, quirky niche communities that enhance our culture in valuable ways.

This is an interesting point. I just rode a motorcycle through southern Utah and was stuck by how much nice housing there was in seemingly ridiculous places. What is the commerce there? Why not Arcosanti with its intentionality and proximity to Phoenix?