Brooks loved this plan. He blocked an effort to undue the annexation while touting the abilities of a developer who had never attempted a project of this scale. The developer and his financiers were also fools to start this project when they did. By the time construction started, it was clear that the national economy was heading for bad times and the market for commercial and residential projects was collapsing. Perhaps they had so much sunk into the project, they didn't see any alternative but to move forward. But I bet that fewer dollars would have been lost if they had simply pulled the plug on the project and waited until the economy recovered.