There is a concept called "path dependence". Something may be important to get you from point A to point B, even if at point B you perhaps don't use it at all.

You start with a place with nice fruit trees near the river, then a few people build their houses there, then someone builds roads and a port, then someone builds larger houses, then someone builds factories... and at some moment in the future, there is a huge city, but the river is poluted and the trees were cut down.

There is another place with no trees and no river. Hundred years later, there is no city.