Somewhere in the back of my mind I seem to remember the Chinese building empty cities in China. This could be the same thing.
@berdie I may well be wrong due to chemo brain,but IF what I remember is a match to what you are writing about,the reason those cities are empty was because the buildings were unbelievably shoddy. I remember seeing photos of brand new multi-story apartment buildings that just fell over. They were just build on flat ground and sitting there without being anchored. Plus stories of plumbing that didn't work,electricity that did nothing but cause fires,etc,etc,etc.
IIRC,the owners of those construction companies were either executed or put into prison for long sentences. The new "cities" remained empty because it was FAR cheaper to just build a new city somewhere than to deconstruct all the stuff already built,haul it off,and start over again from scratch.