Cities are like organisms, and as such, they only grow in the right "habitat" where conditions are right. Namely sites that are intrinsically important in some way, where there are numerous reasons for a city to be there. Proximity to transportation infrastructure is certainly one of the factors, but if that's all you have, lacking will be any of the others you'd find in a great city (most of which tend to be by-products of its having been there a long time, which usually means, maybe ironically, being near the transportation infrastructure we tend to associate with past centuries i.e. rivers, harbors).
Result: You can't create a truly vibrant city in an arbitrary location. You might be able to manage a bedroom community or suburb though.
An example like Shenzhen from a centrally-planned economy would tend to have limited applicability to the US, but this one is interesting because it's the exception that proves the rule. Shenzhen would've been an "important" place regardless, due to its being the first place in "mainland" China north of Hong Kong. Before 1980, the aforementioned central planning kept it from developing as fast as it probably would have otherwise. When they opened it for foreign investment, it took off like releasing a slingshot, hence the high growth rate.
As I said before, it depends on the circumstances. With regards to what those circumstances are, there are a few different combinations of circumstances that would drive rapid growth in a city, and whilst superior public transportation isn't enough on its own, improving infrastructure across the board can be, especially in an area with a high volume of economic activity. For example, look at the growth of Singapore and consider whether that growth would've been possible without a focus on infrastructure.
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Cities are like organisms, and as such, they only grow in the right "habitat" where conditions are right. Namely sites that are intrinsically important in some way, where there are numerous reasons for a city to be there. Proximity to transportation infrastructure is certainly one of the factors, but if that's all you have, lacking will be any of the others you'd find in a great city (most of which tend to be by-products of its having been there a long time, which usually means, maybe ironically, being near the transportation infrastructure we tend to associate with past centuries i.e. rivers, harbors).
Result: You can't create a truly vibrant city in an arbitrary location. You might be able to manage a bedroom community or suburb though.
An example like Shenzhen from a centrally-planned economy would tend to have limited applicability to the US, but this one is interesting because it's the exception that proves the rule. Shenzhen would've been an "important" place regardless, due to its being the first place in "mainland" China north of Hong Kong. Before 1980, the aforementioned central planning kept it from developing as fast as it probably would have otherwise. When they opened it for foreign investment, it took off like releasing a slingshot, hence the high growth rate.
As I said before, it depends on the circumstances. With regards to what those circumstances are, there are a few different combinations of circumstances that would drive rapid growth in a city, and whilst superior public transportation isn't enough on its own, improving infrastructure across the board can be, especially in an area with a high volume of economic activity. For example, look at the growth of Singapore and consider whether that growth would've been possible without a focus on infrastructure.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singapore