datsallfolks

Love the drone footage and you have some of the best photos I've seen from the arena site since the start of construction. Keep up the good work. ps-I read last week they were supposed to start construction on the foundation, has that happened yet or are they still cleaning up from the building implosion?

Considering this is what the area looks like... I would say there's a very good chance the arena will help revitalize this part of town. M-1 Rail helps get Woodward developments rolling As you can see this is a much bigger project than just a sports arena. I'm very hopeful that the city is finally moving in the right direction.

The Detroit arena issue is far more complex than most including Oliver and deadspin care to examine. Ilitch bought up ridiculous amounts of land in what investors called lottery tickets. What wasn't historically available was bought up a decade ago and they asked for sometime 5 times as much as the estimate, so no he didn't get the arena land for $1 like some would like to claim. The DDA state money which is collected annually can be applied to large developmental projects like this one. So no to the education, police and fire crowd, it isn't accessible for those so that angle is really irrelevant. The Cass Corridor is a wasteland. This project connects Woodward from the river to the entertainment district on to Wayne State. It makes the M-1 light rail project, that much more important in my opinion because this will truly connect Midtown with Downtown. Detroit desperately needs this type of investment, Ilitch is going to wind up spending north of 500 million in personal wealth. Will he make a profit? Sure he will. But the Cass Corridor is a ghost town, it is everything people like to point out is wrong with Detroit. The Wings also leave behind waterfront property for redevelopment (the Joe is already scheduled to be demolished for a hotel/residential project). Olympia will also bring the biggest concert venue in from the suburbs where the Palace will now surely lose dates. Plus the Pistons will eventually move to the new arena giving the city 40 extra dates to collect income taxes on (Gores has pretty much stated it's his dream for the team to play in Detroit). There are a lot of net gains here, but people will see what they want to see, and parrot the stuff John Oliver said with no regard for the differences in situations.