The old Nike Missile base at Montrose Harbor in Chicago has been open for years.
Always thought it was open anyway...
That’s not a mountain, that’s a hill.
"The open space district insisted that the Defense Department pay to demolish and haul away the old buildings, but the Pentagon did little. As a result, the summit remained padlocked and off limits for 31 years. Its 88 buildings became a crumbling ghost town contaminated with asbestos and lead paint."
Only the government would take 31 years to do something with a valuable resource, allowing the buildings to fall to ruin while they thought about what to do.
And then they got to work soaking the taxpayers:
"When Abbors became general manager of the district, he made cleaning up the site a priority. Former U.S. Rep. Mike Honda, D-Campbell, and Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-San Jose, secured $3.2 million from Congress in 2009, which paid for the hazardous materials to be removed and the buildings demolished."
"The district’s original estimate to clean and restore the summit was $11 million in 2009. But high bids during the Bay Area construction boom, soaking winter weather last year and other factors caused the price tag to rise to $25 million."
How many private construction projects overrun their budget by more than 200 percent? I wonder if the "other factors" include a lot of new cars, vacations, etc.