how do you start a town?

Question

I understand how a village grows into a town and a town into a city, etc, but I can’t find an understandable answer to how the whole process begins initially. Do a group of people just form a contract and agree to share responsibilities? Who gives up the land? Perhaps it was easier to understand when there was more available land? Any help understanding how the whole ball gets rolling would be much appreciated.

In: Other

Answer 1

There’s a crucial distinction here between *ownership* of the land and *government jurisdiction*. Most people live on privately owned land.* Some private citizen has the right to build structures there, use the land for agriculture, forbid others from entering, etc. Most businesses are also on privately-owned land.

Separately, all land is under the jurisdiction of a government. This determines what laws apply and, potentially, what public services are available. Essentially all land is under some kind of government jurisdiction, even if nobody lives there or takes meaningful ownership of the land.

What you’re asking about is the formation of a local government. This varies from country to country, but in the US, land is under the jurisdiction of the county (a subdivision of a state) by default. People within that county can choose to create an even smaller government just for their local area, which would be called a town/city/village/etc. This does not change the private ownership of any land but may change things like the taxes, laws, and public services available in that area. Towns are usually still “in” their counties (just as counties are still in their states and states are still in the US), so the local government tends to add taxes/laws/services rather than subtract, but there are loopholes and exceptions.

Also, informally, something we would clearly call a town or even a city may choose to never undergo this incorporation process. This is especially common in the western US, where most settlers decided that local governments were not worth the costs and administrative burdens. Large parts of cities like Las Vegas and Los Angeles are unincorporated despite being highly urbanized.

*Note that in some places, significant amounts of land may be directly owned by the government, but these are not places where lots of people tend to live.