Manufacturing Villages can work within an rural/urban area, especially in the towns of middle America. Certainly, enough old manufacturing buildings and malls are available for reconfiguring for homes for many small businesses. In today's economy, with many millennials want to walk or take rapid transit to work instead of driving, investment is circling the old factories and malls for new opportunities.
Manufacturing Villages can exist with separate buildings in close proximity such as an industrial park or in old manufacturing facilities or old malls. Many transformations of old manufacturing buildings will look like the malls. Think about access for shipping, good electricity capabilities, food facilities, day-care facilities, and even lots of parking lots that can be rolled up to build worker housing. Several examples were recently completed in Brooklyn - check along the water on 36th St.- and the old warehouses sure look like malls.
Since Manufacturing Village businesses are small, the products they make are small, and by being fully automated limit waste and pollution, we should see many towns and communities interested in a Manufacturing Village - or two or three - to bolster the local economy and bring old non-taxpaying facilities back on the tax roles.
Once we have one Manufacturing Village example the creation of the next 100 manufacturing villages could rapidly be established.