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Bill Gates Invests $80 Million in Arizona "Smart City"

posted by martyb on Wednesday November 15 2017, @01:05PM   Printer-friendly
from the first-home-is-reserved-for-Winston-Smith dept.

takyon and Phoenix666 write:

Bill Gates is Buying Land in Arizona to Build a "Smart City"

An investment firm run by Bill Gates has put down $80 million to develop a planned community in Arizona. The 25,000 acres of land is about 45 minutes west of Phoenix, in an area called the West Valley. The community, which Gates wants to turn into a "smart city," will be named Belmont.

"Belmont will create a forward-thinking community with a communication and infrastructure spine that embraces cutting-edge technology, designed around high-speed digital networks, data centers, new manufacturing technologies and distribution models, autonomous vehicles and autonomous logistics hubs," Belmont Partners, the Arizona real state investment company involved in the deal, said in a news release.

The proposed freeway I-11, which would connect the Belmont area to Las Vegas, makes the land an ideal spot for a new community, according to Ronald Schott, the executive emeritus at the Arizona Technology Council. Of the 25,000 acres, 3,800 will be used for office, retail, and commercial space. Another 470 acres will be used for public schools. That leaves enough space for 80,000 residential units.

Also at TheUSBPort, Fossbytes, CNET, and Real Estate Daily News.

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  • (Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday November 15 2017, @05:47PM

    by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday November 15 2017, @05:47PM (#597382) Journal

    Bill is building his own fiefdom to avoid pesky democracy.

    Ok, so what? That's what democracy is about. Doing what you choose to do. If Gates is really choosing to build a "fiefdom", then that's his choice. And if people want to live in that, it'll be their choice as well.

    Bill is a one-trick pony: leveraging his existing monopoly and there is no monopoly to utilize here. So this is just going to end up another M$-style failure because there's not any way that Bill can leverage an existing monopoly into something that produces a small city.

    Even if you were accurate here, the developer will have monopoly control on a fair bit of stuff here such as utility access, conditions of the home owners association, and probably rent for the commercial property.