Road City

The Road City is a fictional socio-economic entity invented by noted science fiction author Robert A. Heinlein in his novelette, The Roads Must Roll, published in 1940.

Heinlein's vision of a "Road", always capitalized, was a fully enclosed Slidewalk or multi-speed conveyor belt whose cargo was people and freight, stretching from city to city, and operating at maximum speeds of 100 miles per hour. The Road City was a consequence of this, clearly noted in the story, where people whose livelihood depended on the Road began to live in new communities built along its length. Factories were located along the Road because of easy transport for their goods and materials. Entire businesses established themselves on the conveyor strips to cater to travelers while they moved from city to city, and the people who worked in those business lived within easy reach of the Road itself, living in "the country" but working in "the city".

At the time of writing, the "flight to the suburbs" had not yet taken place in the USA. Superhighways were known from the example of German autobahns but had not taken hold. Heinlein predicted that superhighways would cause what is now called urban sprawl along their routes, and the Road City took the concept further by having the transportation become the core of the urban development.

In Heinlein's Future History, the Road Cities succumb to even more technological progress and social change. In The Man Who Sold The Moon D. D. Harriman calls them "moribund". In Methuselah's Children they are empty relics littering the landscape.