Fiscal 2023 DIF Account

Polar Park And The Private Developer Agreement

This week we saw the ground breaking for Polar Park.     

We have no doubt that Polar Park will be built on time, but predict it will be at least 10%-25% over budget.     The numbers on this project, however, all depend on the private development around the ballpark.   

We can crunch the numbers another time, but for now lets take a look at Detroit and their District Detroit and Little Caesar's Arena.    This Ilitch family through their real estate entities received nearly $400 million to build the arena.

As reported in Crain's Detroit Business, in return the Ilitches:



"promised would anchor up to 50 blocks of new housing, retail, restaurants and bars, offices and green spaces.

The arena was built on time, along with a few offices and parking garages. No housing. No parks. At least not yet. A few small third-party tenants have deals to move into the district."


It doesn't much look like the vivid renderings of a bustling area that the Ilitches showed the public in 2014   "




The City of Detroit as the title of the column indicates has little recourse. 

Detroit has few ways to prod District Detroit development



We look forward to seeing the private development agreements and the groundbreaking for these projects and hope that we do not find ourselves in this same situation.   

Bryant Gumbel feature on District Detroit for Real Sports









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