With the implementation of the bank and uniques I think people will be spending more and more time where they need to do some inventory management. Today there were some times on my ranger where I had both the inventory and bank open and kept getting attacked. For situations where you just need a break out of combat for a couple of minutes and don't have a skill like feign death, it might be nice to have an "empty zone" where you don't get ambushed.

Perhaps this could be the zone in the future where gold is spent as well?

Well, eventually I'd like to put towns in the game... so yeah. It's on the list. I guess that's about what you have in mind.