"But we can't; the riverfront project is really the catalyst for a vital downtown."
It is a vast riverfront project, employing 1,500 construction workers.
In Edgewater, three riverfront projects totaling 460 residences are under way or about to start.
Luther Ely Smith again led the charge for the riverfront project in 1945, leading a group that organized a design competition for the memorial.
It hinges on a $473 million riverfront industrial and residential project, to be financed by industrial revenue bonds.
Work started in 1986 on this riverfront project.
But if philanthropy has eased the economic pain, the riverfront project has in some ways intensified it.
Hovnanian is tapping its own equity and bank credit to finance its riverfront projects, which are to rise on 20 acres.
Applied has long been active along the shoreline and is involved either alone or with partners in three riverfront projects, including the Shipyard in Hoboken.
A riverfront project has been built on Sabarmati River.