Black Rock City

Black Rock City is the temporary community that forms at the Burning Man Festival each year. It was founded in 1990, during the Labor Day weekend, when a small group of people accompanied Burning Man to the Black Rock Desert . Participants, prompted by a natural impulse, formed a circle surrounding a central shade structure, a single parachute and tent pole. This original nucleus has since become the civic core of Black Rock City.

During several intervening years this settlement has grown into a miniature metropolis. The city is now a densely connected grid of streets, plazas, and public landmarks covering more than a square mile of desert terrain. Its thoroughfares are thronged with a population drawn from around the world, and it is served by an array of public institutions; a fire department, a post office, a daily newspaper, an emergency medical service, a Department of Public Works, several radio stations and a safety and security organization known as the Black Rock Rangers.

The most radical feature of this desert civilization is a traditional ban on vending. The original settlement from which Black Rock City has grown was composed of people who knew one another. Within so intimate a circle it seemed inappropriate that anyone should sell goods for commercial gain. As the population has increased, the city has retained this ethic as a prohibition. Apart from the sale of ice, the profits from which are given to the nearby town of Gerlach, and the vending of juice and coffee at our cafe in central camp, nothing is for sale in Black Rock City.