Developer without borders

Comparing his venture on the United States-Mexico border to Ellis Island, California real estate developer C. Samuel Marasco of LandGrant Development said the Las Americas commercial project and international port of entry over the Rio Tijuana connecting San Diego to Tijuana is the perfect symbol of economic cooperation between the two countries.

"This becomes the statement of NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement). We have Mexican and American markets literally joined together," Marasco said, adding that financing for the project comes from a company based in Canada, the third partner in NAFTA.

"But for NAFTA, this project never would have happened. This shows what is possible."

Marasco came to Las Vegas for the spring convention of the International Council of Shopping Centers, which ran Sunday through Wednesday. His company has one property in Nevada, the 225,000-square-foot Whitney Ranch Center in Henderson.

Eager to please local media, Marasco did his best to compare the enormous and enormously complicated development to recent additions to the Strip. Las Americas is designed as a tourist destination with entertainment, shopping, cultural amenities, a large-scale monument and a Spanish colonial theme to its design -- a business model not too alien to Southern Nevada.

"I believe if we can think grand the way Las Vegas thinks grand in terms of architecture and design, we'd like to capture some of that," Marasco said.

Las Americas is nothing if not ambitious. The $260 million, 1.4 million-square-foot, two-city, two-nation complex is no record-setter, but still very large.

The property is mixed-use -- to say the least. It combines commercial and cultural uses, private and public, indoor and outdoor, and Mexican and American. Marasco adds that the project also represents "bipartisan, binational, public-private partnership at its best."

The first phase alone, which is mostly open, features about 75 shops in 370,000 square feet.

Still under construction in phase one is the first public facility within the complex, a library and cultural center designed to reflect both nations. It is being developed in conjunction with the state of California and the city of San Diego.

Although unusual, the library-in-a-mall concept has been used in two of LandGrant's earlier projects. Marasco said it increases a patron's length of stay, which retailers appreciate.

"We really like it because it ties in a lot of the family and cultural aspects of the project, which is so important to what we're trying to accomplish," he said.

Approval for the port of entry is anticipated to come within a year. When it does, LandGrant Development will begin phase two, which includes the bridge, offices plus an office tower, retail expansion, a 300-room hotel, transit center and event centers.

Marasco's target completion date for the entire project is late 2004.

Complementary development is planned for the Tijuana side.

Marasco said the grandeur of the bridge over the Rio Tijuana will reflect its importance to the project and to the nations it connects. He speaks grandly of the proposed 150-foot-high bridge, which is designed to be "a must-see icon for the two countries."

"The signature piece of the entire project is the port of entry over the river," he said. "This will be the first new landmark of the 21st century, something as identifiable as the St. Louis Arch or the Golden Gate Bridge."

Like any other land use issue in the United States, developing the Las Americas site was a local government issue. Because it was also a redevelopment area, Marasco sought support from local redevelopment agencies.

The addition of a library and other cultural amenities increased city involvement in the project, and brought the state of California into the project as well.

From there, the bureaucracy became staggering. To date, LandGrant has negotiated with 22 government entities in the United States and Mexico, including some they may not have realized would play a role. The Immigration and Naturalization Service is in charge of borders, but the Department of Defense had to sign off on the security of the premises as well. Federal officials in Mexico not only manage borders, but micromanage local development in places such as Tijuana.

Marasco may have jumped through more hoops than Siegfried and Roy's tigers, but he knows it's a worthwhile project. The bean counters love it. There are millions of visitors on an annual basis literally within walking distance of the development site who can't wait to visit the complex. In terms of residents alone, there are 2 million people living within a 10-mile radius of the project.

"The economic viability of this project has never been in question. It `pencils' well. The risk is all government. Can we get the various government agencies to sign on to this kind of a project?" Marasco said.

Opening the border just makes sense for both cities and both nations, he explained. The 66 acres in south San Diego County were once undeveloped and underdeveloped, yet literally adjacent to a highly urbanized area. One side needed room for growth; the other needed a new use for a blighted area.

"This area is more economically connected to Tijuana than to San Diego. The two cities are really consolidated in MSA (metropolitan statistical area) terms," Marasco said.

Tijuanans spend nearly $3 billion per year in San Diego, according to Marasco, and citizens of its northern neighbor reciprocate. A new port of entry is expected to increase the flow of business between the two cities, strengthening both sides through increased volume and decreased waiting time for border crossing. The nearest border crossing station, less than a mile away, reports hour-long delays with four-hour delays not uncommon on weekends.

Marasco said reducing the wait for travellers at the border by 15 minutes could add $112 million in productivity.

A new port of entry is viewed as a priority at the highest levels of government on both sides. President Bush and his Mexican counterpart, Vicente Fox, have sought ways to increase legal traffic across the border as a means of mutual economic development.

The border-crossing problem is sheer volume. The existing San Diego-Tijuana port of entry at the end of Interstate 5 -- the busiest border station in the world -- handles 86 million border crossings per year, including 16 million pedestrians. Las Americas could absorb half or more of that foot traffic.

Preempting national security questions, Marasco described how his project fulfills national economic and security interests, stimulating national trade and verifying legal entry through new technology favored by the Office of Homeland Security.

"This port of entry is perfectly in line with public policy," Marasco said.

Following the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, President Bush called for "smart borders" that would use information technology to ease entry for "trusted travellers." A system for vehicles, called SENTRI, is already in use. The new pedestrian port of entry would be the first to use a comparable system for pedestrians. Advocates claim the new systems are faster and more accurate than older ones.

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