In case you haven’t noticed, and if you haven’t, that means you probably haven’t spent much time in the downtown area of San Diego lately.
But if you spend time there, then you’ve noticed all the construction cranes and all the building of new buildings going on.
The long delayed development of the Navy Broadway complex site into the Manchester Pacific Gateway is underway, a project said to cost $1.5 billion dollars. It’s described as the single largest and costliest project in downtown San Diego
And this week, we found out that the company that bought Horton Plaza paid about 175 million dollars for the once trend-setting, but now deteriorating, multi-level outdoor shopping mall. And the start of construction on what the new owners are calling “The Campus at Horton”, is not far off.
The report in the San Diego Union Tribune says they plan to invest hundreds of millions of dollars into Horton Plaza’s transformation into what’s described as an ultra-modern office geared toward top technology firms.
And stroll around some of the other areas of downtown, from Little Italy to the East Village and you’ll see apartment and condo buildings being built and some just completed and some already open and getting filled.
So when it comes to downtown area development, it’s all a sign of an improving economy and ultimately a lot more tax revenue for the city.
But while you stroll around admiring all the construction, you’ll also see signs of a problem that’s not improving as quickly as the economy. That’s the problem of homelessness, with lots of people still living on the streets of downtown San Diego.
Improving that problem should be at least as important as putting up new buildings.
(Photo credit 10News)