Bringing A Chicago Success Story To New Orleans

Inspired by the success of Chicago’s massive Millenium Park in drawing people to the downtown loop, a Chicago real estate investor who owns the badly damaged Hyatt Regency New Orleans is proposing to build “a 20-acre performance arts park anchored by a National Jazz Center” as the anchor of the rebuilt Crescent City. The project would cost $716 million, and “the 20,000-square-foot National Jazz Center, designed by [Pritzker Prize-winning architect Thom] Mayne, would house the New Orleans Jazz Orchestra.”