Five things ancient underground cities have in common with modern ones
They're handy shelters from outside dangers: Modern underground cities are great ways to avoid being stuck in the severe cold or in the rain during a bout of severe weather. Ancient underground cities, like those in the Cappadocia region of Turkey, also served as a way to avoid outside dangers—but in their case, the outside dangers involved religious persecution, as the region was home to some early Christians.
They have areas to display artwork: The ancient catacombs of Rome have become noteworthy for their examples of early Christian art, but not to be outdone, Virginia's Crystal City, outside of the Washington, DC area, has become a hub of underground art.
They have consistent temperatures: One of the biggest benefits of an underground city in the modern day is that you probably won't be shocked by the temperature. It'll probably stay at a happy medium between hot and cold. Likewise, the caves in Turkey's Cappadocia region are known for keeping a consistently cool temperature—55° F, slightly nippier than your standard underground setting but perfect for storing fruit, as it turns out.
They're seen as potential economic drivers: For hundreds of years, Poland's Wieliczka Salt Mine represented the potential that an underground locale could have on an economy. The mine, which dates back to the 13th century, became incredibly important from a financial perspective due to salt's growing necessity in food. (It was still dishing out salt until 2007, shockingly.) And it became one of the world's first major underground tourist attractions, with chapels, dining halls, hotels, and other attractions making way after much of the salt was cleared. Ultimately, when an underground city is created today, this kind of economic success is the goal of the whole operation.
You can book a room in one: Most planned underground cities are associated with hotels, due to the fact that such hotels are common near downtowns. Since the discovery of the ancient caves in Turkey's Cappadocia region 50 years ago, parts of the caves have been converted to hotels as well. (Prices aren't bad, either; you can get a high-end room at the Cappadocia Cave Suites hotel for $150 a night.)
The growth of the modern underground city was an attempt to make urban areas warmer and less scary
— Charissa N. Terranova, an associate professor of aesthetic studies at the University of Texas at Dallas, discussing the issues with Dallas' underground city in a 2009 academic article for the Urban History Review. Terranova (whose last name means "New Earth" in Italian, making her the perfect person to write about this topic) notes in her piece that the reason why the project failed in Dallas is because of a misconception of how bad the congestion actually would be in the 21st century—which is to say, it wasn't as bad as everyone thought, and that created competition for business between the underground city and the above-ground one."As experienced underneath the city while walking through its tunnels, life in downtown Dallas is a midday event. Lunch hour in the underground walkway system bristles with activity—people dining, shopping, and having their shoes shined. The din of activity expires at around 2 PM, after which passage through the underground walkway is a silent activity. By 5 PM the underground walkway system is a ghost town. Planners and pundits who originally envisioned the project in the late 1960s would never have predicted the anemic life of Dallas's pedestrian-way today."
As urban areas got less scary, underground cities became less fashionable
Going back to the impressive find in Nevşehir from a few years back, the mayor of the city said something really interesting about the discovery this week. He has his eye on taking this utterly stunning finding in the city center and turning it something closer to Montreal than an artifact."They used to say that there were only some storage places underground," Mayor Hasan Ünver told Turkey's Doğan News Agency. "We want to turn this underground city, which is the world's largest one and includes 11 neighborhoods, into a livable place in the city center. We plan to make it a social life center with a conference center and museum."Obviously, this sort of talk touches a weird place in the soul that hits halfway between preservation and modernization. If handled right, this underground city could be a meal ticket for the entire metro region, holding value not just as a tourist hub but a discussion point. But it could also damage much of the history that's inside the cave in the name of modern interests.If you were the mayor of this Turkish town, what would you do?