Results thus far generally have been positive for the 0 million Zappos and its CEO, Tony Hsieh, have made to revitalize Downtown Las Vegas.
One are of which he Hsieh particularly is pleased is the Container Park area near Fremont and 7th streets, which is a place that was no safe to walk around just a couple years ago.
The $350 million investment in Downtown Las Vegas primarily focuses on funding small businesses, such as restaurants, bars, and a bookstore; a venture capital fund; and real estate development, the Las Vegas Sun reported.
Hsieh wants all three investments areas to generate positive revenue by 2016, but the Las Vegas Sun says local critics complain he isn’t doing enough to develop residential housing, say he closed several small businesses, and many of the local investments failed.
“The expectations that people have in terms of what community means, is, we’ve learned, very different when you’re talking about an actual neighborhood,” Hsieh told the Sun. “We had some people start expecting us to do certain things that maybe would be expectations for what the government should be doing.”
Hsieh acknowledged limitations on what his Downtown Project investment can accomplish and suggested greater governmental involvement could spur some of the developments other say he should be doing.
