Though a very complicated deal with several moving parts—as reported by the Sacramento Bee—the beauty of it, is how it can help solve one of the most intractable problems on the Parkway.
For many years Parkway adjacent neighborhoods in the area stretching from Cal Expo to Discovery Park, have been burdened by the public safety issues arising from illegal camping by the homeless, some of whom are criminals.
The residential and commercial development of Cal Expo—as a key part of this plan—will serve the same purpose as the Township 9 development will on the south bank; bring more people to the area for legitimate reasons.
More people in the area will reduce the illegal camping and increase the public’s safety in accessing the most beautiful natural resource in our community.
An excerpt.
“In the past month alone, the company proposing to bankroll an arena in downtown Sacramento bought a financial-management firm in Philadelphia for $450 million and launched a $400 million fund to invest in Mexico. It teamed with the government of Abu Dhabi and a Canadian pension fund to bid $6 billion for an electricity grid in England.
“The point is, would-be arena financier Macquarie Group Ltd. of Sydney, Australia, is used to doing deals as big as a basketball arena – and then some. In Sacramento, Macquarie is prepared to pour millions of dollars of capital into a sports and entertainment complex at the downtown railyard, raising hopes among NBA executives and others that this is the plan that will finally bring a new arena to the city.
“But even Macquarie executives acknowledge the complexities in the proposal, an audacious three-ring circus that would relocate the California State Fair to the area around Arco Arena and turn Cal Expo into a real estate cash cow that would nourish the construction of the downtown sports complex.
“The entire development would take hundreds of millions of dollars and years to complete – and is being hatched in the midst of a recession that has devastated the real estate market.
“While the three projects involved "on their own are pretty usual and normal," pulling them together is the big wrinkle, Macquarie's Sacramento point man, Nicholas Hann, said in an interview this week.”
