The Town Where Everyone Lives in One Building
A Cold War Relic Becomes a Home
Whittier, Alaska is a town of about 300 people. It has a school, a police station, a post office, a grocery store, and a church. Nothing unusual — except all of these things, along with nearly every resident, exist inside a single 14-story concrete building called Begich Towers.
The building wasn't designed as a town. It was built in 1957 as military housing for the U.S. Army's Cold War operations in Alaska. The Buckner Building — a massive structure nearby that once held 1,000 soldiers — was its companion. When the military left in the 1960s, the town didn't disappear. It just... consolidated.
Why One Building Makes Sense
Whittier gets about 250 inches of snow per year. Winds regularly exceed 60 mph. In winter, temperatures drop well below zero and daylight lasts only a few hours. Walking between buildings isn't just inconvenient — it can be dangerous.
So the residents made a practical choice: put everything under one roof.
Begich Towers contains 150 two-bedroom apartments, the city offices, a medical clinic, a laundromat, and a general store. The school is connected by an underground tunnel. The post office is on the first floor. Your neighbor might be the mayor, the teacher, and the person who runs the grocery store — because in Whittier, they often are.
The Only Way In
For decades, the only way to reach Whittier was by boat or by train through a 2.5-mile tunnel carved through Maynard Mountain. In 2000, the Anton Anderson Memorial Tunnel was converted to allow cars — but it's a one-lane tunnel shared with the Alaska Railroad. Traffic alternates directions on a schedule. Miss your window, and you wait.
This isolation isn't a bug. Residents chose it. The tunnel creates a natural boundary between Whittier and the rest of the world. There's no through-traffic, no accidental tourists (well, some cruise ship passengers in summer), and no sprawl.
What It's Actually Like
From the outside, Begich Towers looks like a Soviet apartment block dropped into a fjord. Gray concrete, small windows, functional to the point of brutalism. It's not pretty.
But inside, residents describe something unexpected: community. When you share a building with your entire town, you know everyone. Kids play in the hallways. Neighbors watch each other's apartments. The building manager is also your neighbor. There's no anonymity, which means there's also no isolation.
"It's like a vertical small town," one resident told a documentary crew. "Except you don't need a car to visit anyone."
The Buckner Building — The One That Didn't Make It
Not everything survived the military's departure. The Buckner Building — once called "a city under one roof" by the Army — was abandoned in 1966 after the 1964 earthquake damaged it. It still stands, empty and deteriorating, a massive concrete ghost visible from Begich Towers.
It's a reminder that the one-building concept wasn't always intentional. It was born from military pragmatism, survived through civilian adaptation, and persists because it genuinely works for the people who live there.
What Whittier Teaches
Urban planners occasionally point to Whittier as an extreme example of mixed-use development — the idea that putting residential, commercial, and civic functions in the same structure creates stronger communities. Most cities try to achieve this with zoning changes and incentive programs. Whittier achieved it by accident and necessity.
The lesson isn't "everyone should live in one building." It's that proximity creates connection. When the school, the store, the clinic, and your home are all within walking distance — or in this case, an elevator ride — something changes about how people relate to each other.
Three hundred people, one building, 250 inches of snow per year. It shouldn't work. But it does.
The Numbers
- Population: ~300
- Building: Begich Towers, 14 stories, built 1957
- Snowfall: ~250 inches/year
- Wind: Regular gusts over 60 mph
- Tunnel: 2.5 miles, one lane, shared with railroad
- Apartments: 150 units
- Distance to Anchorage: 60 miles (but feels like another world)