Questions regarding the River Development

[YoungTulsan]

quote:Originally posted by Oil Capital

quote:Originally posted by YoungTulsan

169 gets people to the shopping malls.  The BA comes close enough to the fairgrounds (31st and Yale) without having an offramp emptying directly into Expo Square.  When the BA was built, downtown was a major activity center AND place of employment.

Where would YOU put the highways?

NEXT to the shopping malls, NEXT to the fairgrounds.   (Or perhaps the shopping malls should have been built NEXT to the freeways; either way, what we have is bad planning) The closest 169 gets to a shopping mall is Woodland Hills and it's a mile from that.  It's over a mile from 31st and Harvard to the nearest fairgrounds entrance.

While Woodland Hills is the only technical "mall" there, there is nothing but shopping as far as the eye can see from 71st and 169.

Again, where would you put the highways?  Perhaps the BA would go straight across town just north of 15th?  A freeway down Memorial and a freeway across the 71st corridor?  (from a mere hindsight planning perspective, not talking about what would be destroyed if we did it today)

[Conan71]

Swake you are kind of dancing around the issue and parsing between improvements and repairs.  Fine and good, we need about $1 bln in repairs.  Happy now? []

We do need improvements still for 81st street and south and between roughly the river and at least Memorial.  Nice wide intersections, two lane roads in between.  Don't we still have a 3rd penny tax which will eventually pay for those improvements and has paid for many others?

Still not a basis for my opposition to the river plan presently on the table.  Two separate issues.  However, if we need a sales tax proposal to catch up with the back log on street repairs, it's going to be a harder sell to tax payers after they've okayed the river tax.

We just need to figure out what our true priorities are.  Streets? Public safety? River?

[swake]

quote:Originally posted by Oil Capital

quote:Originally posted by swake

quote:Originally posted by ttown_jeff

quote:Originally posted by swake

Originally posted by tim huntzinger

Originally posted by swake



...our surface transportation system is worlds better than cities that grow many times faster than us.

I'm sure you have some way of qualifying this?

Of course I do, I'm not some blogger

Fourth lowest commute time for metro areas with more than 250,000 people.

http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/releases/archives/american_community_survey_acs/004489.html

Quote:
  In contrast, workers in several cities are fortunate enough to experience relatively short commute times, including Corpus Christi, Texas (16.1 minutes); Wichita, Kan. (16.3 minutes); Tulsa, Okla. (17.1 minutes); and Omaha, Neb. (17.3 minutes). (See city rankings [PDF].)

Data is 2005

Oh, puhlease.  You're playing that one again?  That ranking tells us little more than that Tulsa is smaller than almost every other city in those rankings.  (Almost every city with longer commutes is either a larger city or is a component of a much larger metro area than Tulsa.)  

Personally, I cannot think of a city with a more seemingly random freeway layout, or where the freeway "system" fails to directly serve major activity centers (ie, fairgrounds, shopping malls...)  At times, it seems that Tulsa plans streets, highways, and intersections to create congestion.

It's a list of the 68 largest cities, and Tulsa is the 45th largest city in national and was 66th on the list. So there are 21 cities smaller than Tulsa on the list with a worse commute. Lexington, KY, Colorado Springs, Tucson are examples that would be in conflict with your statement. And, Tulsa county is in the bottom ten counties in commute time out of 233 counties.

Also, while it is true that larger cities have longer commutes, they have become larger cities due to stronger growth, which goes to my point that road infrastructure is a poor way to drive growth, because most big and fast growing cities have miserable road transportation systems.

[swake]

quote:Originally posted by Conan71

Swake you are kind of dancing around the issue and parsing between improvements and repairs.  Fine and good, we need about $1 bln in repairs.  Happy now? []

We do need improvements still for 81st street and south and between roughly the river and at least Memorial.  Nice wide intersections, two lane roads in between.  Don't we still have a 3rd penny tax which will eventually pay for those improvements and has paid for many others?

Still not a basis for my opposition to the river plan presently on the table.  Two separate issues.  However, if we need a sales tax proposal to catch up with the back log on street repairs, it's going to be a harder sell to tax payers after they've okayed the river tax.

We just need to figure out what our true priorities are.  Streets? Public safety? River?

Now are you are asking the right questions

The argument being made is "do streets first". But, streets and the river are two different issues. The questions that need to be asked is what do we need more, economic development or infrastructure maintenance. And, is it possible to afford both at the same time.

The river plan provides a big return on the amount of tax revenue collected. Something in the range of a billion dollars in the city alone on less than half a cent of sales tax. From an economic development perspective, that's a really good deal and the cost is minor enough is should not preclude the city's ability to ask for some amount of GO bond for streets. In addition, new economic development of this magnitude will go a long way to helping the city with it's operational budget crunch and may well alleviate some of the need to for a GO bond. Though I would argue the backlog of repairs is great enough that both are needed.

[Conan71]

quote:Originally posted by swake

quote:Originally posted by Conan71

Swake you are kind of dancing around the issue and parsing between improvements and repairs.  Fine and good, we need about $1 bln in repairs.  Happy now? []

We do need improvements still for 81st street and south and between roughly the river and at least Memorial.  Nice wide intersections, two lane roads in between.  Don't we still have a 3rd penny tax which will eventually pay for those improvements and has paid for many others?

Still not a basis for my opposition to the river plan presently on the table.  Two separate issues.  However, if we need a sales tax proposal to catch up with the back log on street repairs, it's going to be a harder sell to tax payers after they've okayed the river tax.

We just need to figure out what our true priorities are.  Streets? Public safety? River?

Now are you are asking the right questions

The argument being made is "do streets first". But, streets and the river are two different issues. The questions that need to be asked is what do we need more, economic development or infrastructure maintenance. And, is it possible to afford both at the same time.

The river plan provides a big return on the amount of tax revenue collected. Something in the range of a billion dollars in the city alone on less than half a cent of sales tax. From an economic development perspective, that's a really good deal and the cost is minor enough is should not preclude the city's ability to ask for some amount of GO bond for streets. In addition, new economic development of this magnitude will go a long way to helping the city with it's operational budget crunch and may well alleviate some of the need to for a GO bond. Though I would argue the backlog of repairs is great enough that both are needed.

Swake, I've been disputing these tax revenue numbers long before Michael Bates went after it in his editorial this week.  If you are talking about additional private commercial investment spurred by the tax and private donations, okay.  However, it's really not a "necessity" for someone to purchase the concrete plant and start developing.  That can happen with or with out LWD's at Jenks and Sand Springs.

If you are talking about the estimates of all the new sales tax revenue generated by construction along the river, I suspect sales tax will be waived on construction materials, so any benefit from construction investment in the tax pool is nixed.  Secondly, $284mm of that is recycled tax money, it's not all new infusion.  Granted, we might see a rise in sales tax collections if people might need to relocate here for a couple of years to work on projects along the river.  After that, if we don't have more work for those people, they move on and we are back to our original sales tax base.

Let's get on to tax collected at commercial development after it's opened.  This generates new sales tax revenue only when it comes in from visitors to Tulsa.  Otherwise all you are doing is shifting the income tax collection points from other geographic areas of Tulsa.

We can argue all we want that an improved river will cause companies to relocate here by the droves, but that's fairy tale talk.

[swake]

Not really,

It is not just recycled tax money. There are about 950,000 people in the metro, and about 390,000 people in the city, it's about encouraging more of the 560,000 people that live outside the city (along with visitors to the metro) to spend more money in the city.

And you can call the new job numbers "fairy tales", but my company has three director level jobs in technical departments that have been open for months and likely all three pay well into the six digits. And my guess is if they aren't filled before too long, those jobs will go to another office. We need to make Tulsa a more desirable place to live

[RecycleMichael]

quote:Originally posted by swake
...but my company has three director level jobs in technical departments that have been open for months and likely all three pay well into the six digits. And my guess is if they aren't filled before too long, those jobs will go to another office...

Dang...if only I had some of them things they call "skills". I could sure use one of them six digit jobs.

My job also pays six digits, but there is a decimal involved.

[Oil Capital]

quote:Originally posted by swake

quote:Originally posted by Oil Capital

quote:Originally posted by swake

quote:Originally posted by ttown_jeff

quote:Originally posted by swake

Originally posted by tim huntzinger

Originally posted by swake



...our surface transportation system is worlds better than cities that grow many times faster than us.

I'm sure you have some way of qualifying this?

Of course I do, I'm not some blogger

Fourth lowest commute time for metro areas with more than 250,000 people.

http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/releases/archives/american_community_survey_acs/004489.html

Quote:
  In contrast, workers in several cities are fortunate enough to experience relatively short commute times, including Corpus Christi, Texas (16.1 minutes); Wichita, Kan. (16.3 minutes); Tulsa, Okla. (17.1 minutes); and Omaha, Neb. (17.3 minutes). (See city rankings [PDF].)

Data is 2005

Oh, puhlease.  You're playing that one again?  That ranking tells us little more than that Tulsa is smaller than almost every other city in those rankings.  (Almost every city with longer commutes is either a larger city or is a component of a much larger metro area than Tulsa.)  

Personally, I cannot think of a city with a more seemingly random freeway layout, or where the freeway "system" fails to directly serve major activity centers (ie, fairgrounds, shopping malls...)  At times, it seems that Tulsa plans streets, highways, and intersections to create congestion.

It's a list of the 68 largest cities, and Tulsa is the 45th largest city in national and was 66th on the list. So there are 21 cities smaller than Tulsa on the list with a worse commute. Lexington, KY, Colorado Springs, Tucson are examples that would be in conflict with your statement. And, Tulsa county is in the bottom ten counties in commute time out of 233 counties.

Also, while it is true that larger cities have longer commutes, they have become larger cities due to stronger growth, which goes to my point that road infrastructure is a poor way to drive growth, because most big and fast growing cities have miserable road transportation systems.

and how many of those 21 smaller cities are components of larger metropolitan areas?  Kind of overlooked that part, didn't you?  Here are a few of those "smaller cities" that, amazingly, have longer commutes than Tulsa:  Minneapolis, St. Louis, Arlington TX, Anaheim CA, Tampa, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, Newark...

And, Tucson??   Tucson Arizona, Population 518,000, metro population 946,000, is that the Tucson you are referring to as being smaller than Tulsa?  You've been kind of lax on the fact-checking here recently, Swake.

Bottom line, Tulsa's commute time is nothing extraordinary or even noteworthy, for a city of its size.

[swake]

quote:Originally posted by Oil Capital

quote:Originally posted by swake

quote:Originally posted by Oil Capital

quote:Originally posted by swake

quote:Originally posted by ttown_jeff

quote:Originally posted by swake

Originally posted by tim huntzinger

Originally posted by swake



...our surface transportation system is worlds better than cities that grow many times faster than us.

I'm sure you have some way of qualifying this?

Of course I do, I'm not some blogger

Fourth lowest commute time for metro areas with more than 250,000 people.

http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/releases/archives/american_community_survey_acs/004489.html

Quote:
  In contrast, workers in several cities are fortunate enough to experience relatively short commute times, including Corpus Christi, Texas (16.1 minutes); Wichita, Kan. (16.3 minutes); Tulsa, Okla. (17.1 minutes); and Omaha, Neb. (17.3 minutes). (See city rankings [PDF].)

Data is 2005

Oh, puhlease.  You're playing that one again?  That ranking tells us little more than that Tulsa is smaller than almost every other city in those rankings.  (Almost every city with longer commutes is either a larger city or is a component of a much larger metro area than Tulsa.)  

Personally, I cannot think of a city with a more seemingly random freeway layout, or where the freeway "system" fails to directly serve major activity centers (ie, fairgrounds, shopping malls...)  At times, it seems that Tulsa plans streets, highways, and intersections to create congestion.

It's a list of the 68 largest cities, and Tulsa is the 45th largest city in national and was 66th on the list. So there are 21 cities smaller than Tulsa on the list with a worse commute. Lexington, KY, Colorado Springs, Tucson are examples that would be in conflict with your statement. And, Tulsa county is in the bottom ten counties in commute time out of 233 counties.

Also, while it is true that larger cities have longer commutes, they have become larger cities due to stronger growth, which goes to my point that road infrastructure is a poor way to drive growth, because most big and fast growing cities have miserable road transportation systems.

and how many of those 21 smaller cities are components of larger metropolitan areas?  Kind of overlooked that part, didn't you?  Here are a few of those "smaller cities" that, amazingly, have longer commutes than Tulsa:  Minneapolis, St. Louis, Arlington TX, Anaheim CA, Tampa, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, Newark...

And, Tucson??   Tucson Arizona, Population 518,000, metro population 946,000, is that the Tucson you are referring to as being smaller than Tulsa?  You've been kind of lax on the fact-checking here recently, Swake.

Bottom line, Tulsa's commute time is nothing extraordinary or even noteworthy, for a city of its size.

Metro Tulsa 946,993, Tucson 946,362, 2006, USCensus.

It's not much smaller, but it IS smaller.

[Oil Capital]

quote:Originally posted by swake

quote:Originally posted by Oil Capital

quote:Originally posted by swake

quote:Originally posted by Oil Capital

quote:Originally posted by swake

quote:Originally posted by ttown_jeff

quote:Originally posted by swake

Originally posted by tim huntzinger

Originally posted by swake



...our surface transportation system is worlds better than cities that grow many times faster than us.

I'm sure you have some way of qualifying this?

Of course I do, I'm not some blogger

Fourth lowest commute time for metro areas with more than 250,000 people.

http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/releases/archives/american_community_survey_acs/004489.html

Quote:
  In contrast, workers in several cities are fortunate enough to experience relatively short commute times, including Corpus Christi, Texas (16.1 minutes); Wichita, Kan. (16.3 minutes); Tulsa, Okla. (17.1 minutes); and Omaha, Neb. (17.3 minutes). (See city rankings [PDF].)

Data is 2005

Oh, puhlease.  You're playing that one again?  That ranking tells us little more than that Tulsa is smaller than almost every other city in those rankings.  (Almost every city with longer commutes is either a larger city or is a component of a much larger metro area than Tulsa.)  

Personally, I cannot think of a city with a more seemingly random freeway layout, or where the freeway "system" fails to directly serve major activity centers (ie, fairgrounds, shopping malls...)  At times, it seems that Tulsa plans streets, highways, and intersections to create congestion.

It's a list of the 68 largest cities, and Tulsa is the 45th largest city in national and was 66th on the list. So there are 21 cities smaller than Tulsa on the list with a worse commute. Lexington, KY, Colorado Springs, Tucson are examples that would be in conflict with your statement. And, Tulsa county is in the bottom ten counties in commute time out of 233 counties.

Also, while it is true that larger cities have longer commutes, they have become larger cities due to stronger growth, which goes to my point that road infrastructure is a poor way to drive growth, because most big and fast growing cities have miserable road transportation systems.

and how many of those 21 smaller cities are components of larger metropolitan areas?  Kind of overlooked that part, didn't you?  Here are a few of those "smaller cities" that, amazingly, have longer commutes than Tulsa:  Minneapolis, St. Louis, Arlington TX, Anaheim CA, Tampa, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, Newark...

And, Tucson??   Tucson Arizona, Population 518,000, metro population 946,000, is that the Tucson you are referring to as being smaller than Tulsa?  You've been kind of lax on the fact-checking here recently, Swake.

Bottom line, Tulsa's commute time is nothing extraordinary or even noteworthy, for a city of its size.

Metro Tulsa 946,993, Tucson 946,362, 2006, USCensus.

It's not much smaller, but it IS smaller.

Yes, Swake, I figured you'd be pulling out the Tulsa COMBINED metro number, rather than the Metro number.  Nice try.  

(For those who don't know, the Combined Metro area includes Bartlesville... the reason Washington County (Bartlesville) is not in the standard metro area is lack of economic connection, i.e. commuting, between Bartlesville and Tulsa)

[MichaelBates]

quote:Originally posted by swake

And you can call the new job numbers "fairy tales", but my company has three director level jobs in technical departments that have been open for months and likely all three pay well into the six digits. And my guess is if they aren't filled before too long, those jobs will go to another office. We need to make Tulsa a more desirable place to live

What reasons have candidates given for turning the jobs down?

[swake]

quote:Originally posted by Oil Capital

quote:Originally posted by swake

quote:Originally posted by Oil Capital

quote:Originally posted by swake

quote:Originally posted by Oil Capital

quote:Originally posted by swake

quote:Originally posted by ttown_jeff

quote:Originally posted by swake

Originally posted by tim huntzinger

Originally posted by swake



...our surface transportation system is worlds better than cities that grow many times faster than us.

I'm sure you have some way of qualifying this?

Of course I do, I'm not some blogger

Fourth lowest commute time for metro areas with more than 250,000 people.

http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/releases/archives/american_community_survey_acs/004489.html

Quote:
  In contrast, workers in several cities are fortunate enough to experience relatively short commute times, including Corpus Christi, Texas (16.1 minutes); Wichita, Kan. (16.3 minutes); Tulsa, Okla. (17.1 minutes); and Omaha, Neb. (17.3 minutes). (See city rankings [PDF].)

Data is 2005

Oh, puhlease.  You're playing that one again?  That ranking tells us little more than that Tulsa is smaller than almost every other city in those rankings.  (Almost every city with longer commutes is either a larger city or is a component of a much larger metro area than Tulsa.)  

Personally, I cannot think of a city with a more seemingly random freeway layout, or where the freeway "system" fails to directly serve major activity centers (ie, fairgrounds, shopping malls...)  At times, it seems that Tulsa plans streets, highways, and intersections to create congestion.

It's a list of the 68 largest cities, and Tulsa is the 45th largest city in national and was 66th on the list. So there are 21 cities smaller than Tulsa on the list with a worse commute. Lexington, KY, Colorado Springs, Tucson are examples that would be in conflict with your statement. And, Tulsa county is in the bottom ten counties in commute time out of 233 counties.

Also, while it is true that larger cities have longer commutes, they have become larger cities due to stronger growth, which goes to my point that road infrastructure is a poor way to drive growth, because most big and fast growing cities have miserable road transportation systems.

and how many of those 21 smaller cities are components of larger metropolitan areas?  Kind of overlooked that part, didn't you?  Here are a few of those "smaller cities" that, amazingly, have longer commutes than Tulsa:  Minneapolis, St. Louis, Arlington TX, Anaheim CA, Tampa, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, Newark...

And, Tucson??   Tucson Arizona, Population 518,000, metro population 946,000, is that the Tucson you are referring to as being smaller than Tulsa?  You've been kind of lax on the fact-checking here recently, Swake.

Bottom line, Tulsa's commute time is nothing extraordinary or even noteworthy, for a city of its size.

Metro Tulsa 946,993, Tucson 946,362, 2006, USCensus.

It's not much smaller, but it IS smaller.

Yes, Swake, I figured you'd be pulling out the Tulsa COMBINED metro number, rather than the Metro number.  Nice try.  

(For those who don't know, the Combined Metro area includes Bartlesville... the reason Washington County (Bartlesville) is not in the standard metro area is lack of economic connection, i.e. commuting, between Bartlesville and Tulsa)

Still valid as Tucson does not have a CSA.

[Oil Capital]

quote:Originally posted by swake

quote:Originally posted by Oil Capital

quote:Originally posted by swake

quote:Originally posted by Oil Capital

quote:Originally posted by swake

quote:Originally posted by Oil Capital

quote:Originally posted by swake

quote:Originally posted by ttown_jeff

quote:Originally posted by swake

Originally posted by tim huntzinger

Originally posted by swake



...our surface transportation system is worlds better than cities that grow many times faster than us.

I'm sure you have some way of qualifying this?

Of course I do, I'm not some blogger

Fourth lowest commute time for metro areas with more than 250,000 people.

http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/releases/archives/american_community_survey_acs/004489.html

Quote:
  In contrast, workers in several cities are fortunate enough to experience relatively short commute times, including Corpus Christi, Texas (16.1 minutes); Wichita, Kan. (16.3 minutes); Tulsa, Okla. (17.1 minutes); and Omaha, Neb. (17.3 minutes). (See city rankings [PDF].)

Data is 2005

Oh, puhlease.  You're playing that one again?  That ranking tells us little more than that Tulsa is smaller than almost every other city in those rankings.  (Almost every city with longer commutes is either a larger city or is a component of a much larger metro area than Tulsa.)  

Personally, I cannot think of a city with a more seemingly random freeway layout, or where the freeway "system" fails to directly serve major activity centers (ie, fairgrounds, shopping malls...)  At times, it seems that Tulsa plans streets, highways, and intersections to create congestion.

It's a list of the 68 largest cities, and Tulsa is the 45th largest city in national and was 66th on the list. So there are 21 cities smaller than Tulsa on the list with a worse commute. Lexington, KY, Colorado Springs, Tucson are examples that would be in conflict with your statement. And, Tulsa county is in the bottom ten counties in commute time out of 233 counties.

Also, while it is true that larger cities have longer commutes, they have become larger cities due to stronger growth, which goes to my point that road infrastructure is a poor way to drive growth, because most big and fast growing cities have miserable road transportation systems.

and how many of those 21 smaller cities are components of larger metropolitan areas?  Kind of overlooked that part, didn't you?  Here are a few of those "smaller cities" that, amazingly, have longer commutes than Tulsa:  Minneapolis, St. Louis, Arlington TX, Anaheim CA, Tampa, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, Newark...

And, Tucson??   Tucson Arizona, Population 518,000, metro population 946,000, is that the Tucson you are referring to as being smaller than Tulsa?  You've been kind of lax on the fact-checking here recently, Swake.

Bottom line, Tulsa's commute time is nothing extraordinary or even noteworthy, for a city of its size.

Metro Tulsa 946,993, Tucson 946,362, 2006, USCensus.

It's not much smaller, but it IS smaller.

Yes, Swake, I figured you'd be pulling out the Tulsa COMBINED metro number, rather than the Metro number.  Nice try.  

(For those who don't know, the Combined Metro area includes Bartlesville... the reason Washington County (Bartlesville) is not in the standard metro area is lack of economic connection, i.e. commuting, between Bartlesville and Tulsa)

Still valid as Tucson does not have a CSA.

Whatever you need to be able to hang on to your delusions, Swake.  However you want to rank
Tucson compared to Tulsa, the simple fact remains that this commute ranking tells us little more than that Tulsa is one of the smaller metropolitan areas in the list of cities.

Give the list a careful look and you'll find that the 65 cities only represent 55 metropolitan areas.  If you factor in the Combined Metro areas, I believe Tulsa is the 52nd largest metro area in the country.  In the commute time rankings, when you consolidate the cities into their metro areas (e.g. NYC and Newark are both on the list, both are obviously the NYC metro), Tulsa ranks 53rd out of 55, almost exactly the same relative ranking as its population.  When you look over the list, it is not particularly impressive for Tulsa to be right where it is.  It is, in fact, right where one would expect it to be.  (In fact, dare I say it... OKC's relative ranking is really more impressive than Tulsa's...  OKC's metro population ranks it at about 42nd in population and is no. 50 in this commuter time.)  

Yes, we have shorter commute times than larger cities. That's one of the charms of living in a smaller city, isn't it?

[CoffeeBean]

The concrete plant slated for purchase is directly across from a slum - and that's being generous.  

Can someone exlain if there are plans to remove that apartment complex?  

If not, I cannot see any developer locating any - ANY - commercial development across the street from a crime incubator.  

If history is any indicator, look at the current state of the empty Albertson's building at Pine & Peoria.  All the other Albertson's are still in use - except this one - despite the monumental effort to redevelop the surrounding area.

Perhaps I'm wrong, but this issue gives me pause after a recent visit to River West.  In fact, I would venture to guess that removal of the apartment complex - by itself - would do more for river development in this area than purchasing the concrete facility.  

(by the way, for those who care to visit, the TPD crime overlay for this area suggests this concern is not merely fanciful, but real and progressive).        

[swake]

quote:Originally posted by CoffeeBean

The concrete plant slated for purchase is directly across from a slum - and that's being generous.  

Can someone exlain if there are plans to remove that apartment complex?  

If not, I cannot see any developer locating any - ANY - commercial development across the street from a crime incubator.  

If history is any indicator, look at the current state of the empty Albertson's building at Pine & Peoria.  All the other Albertson's are still in use - except this one - despite the monumental effort to redevelop the surrounding area.

Perhaps I'm wrong, but this issue gives me pause after a recent visit to River West.  In fact, I would venture to guess that removal of the apartment complex - by itself - would do more for river development in this area than purchasing the concrete facility.  

(by the way, for those who care to visit, the TPD crime overlay for this area suggests this concern is not merely fanciful, but real and progressive).        

The developer of Branson Landing has said he wants to spend half a billion dollars on a development on that site.