California’s New City Might Actually Happen

When news of California Forever’s plans to build a new city 60 miles northeast of San Francisco broke two and a half years ago, there were plenty of reasons to be skeptical of the project. With nearly 70,000 acres assembled in secrecy and ties to San Francisco’s tech community, California Forever triggered an intensely negative response. Everyone from local community groups to members of Congress had something to say, and much of it wasn’t good.

Even people who like new cities and appreciated California Forever’s approach to urbanism – like us here at Thesis Driven — criticized their process.

And since the project needed a county-wide referendum to proceed, California Forever appeared to have an uphill battle. When the company behind the project pulled the approval referendum from the ballot in mid-2024, many pundits wrote the whole plan off for good.

But the obituaries for Solano County’s new city may have been premature. Over the past year, California Forever has found a fresh legal path to entitlements. And with newfound support from organized labor, California Forever is finally looking more likely than not — and they’re beginning to contemplate the role other developers can play in bringing it to life.

Today’s letter will explore California Forever’s winding path and increasingly bright future.

How We Got Here

It is not easy to assemble nearly 70,000 acres of contiguous land without being noticed. Working under the moniker Flannery Associates, Jan Sramek began purchasing land in rural Solano County after raising initial funding from a number of Silicon Valley luminaries — Marc Andreessen and Reid Hoffman, among others — in 2017. 

The proposed new city’s initial plans included an urbanist’s wish list: gentle density with a mix of townhomes, apartments, retail, bike lanes, and walkable streets blending the best of 19th century urban design with 21st century architecture. While the city could eventually hold up to 400,000 people, its urban density also allowed about a third of its acreage to remain open parkland.