Legoland

I have been watching with intrigue the construction across what was a street in front of my office in Lees Summit.  They have taken out many acres of forest between I-470 and Chipman Road and are constructing where a creek used to run, a giant mountain of dirt. It now arches high over the trees and dominates the landscape.  They have completely ripped out the street and a huge chunk of the parking lot and are reconstructing the street closer to our building by a few hundred feet.  In an area where I used to drive slowly in the evening to see how many deer and turkeys I could see, they are putting down pipes and burying manholes.  (7 deer and 4 gobblers is the record.)  What is being constructed which is this massive in scale?  The answer is Legoland, Missouri!  The taxpayers of Lees Summit are getting soaked for 120 million bucks.  The entire project costs 155 million.  That means the company who runs Legoland only had to put up 35 million to get it built.  Sweet deal.  I wonder what other towns were competing to get Legoland?  I'm grateful that I don't live in Lees Summit.  Meanwhile, I get to traverse an ever more complex labyrinth of road blocks, speed bumps, and detours to get into the parking lot.  I feel like I'm halfway to work when I get to the final block.  I have to use a side street with obsoleted stop signs which need to be covered or removed, then enter a parking lot on the wrong side of the building and traverse a newly constructed road which connects that parking lot to ours, upon which they promptly installed speed bumps.  The Canadian geese have invaded the green spaces around our building to flee the destruction of their habitat across the way.  What's the upside?

We get a theme park which is supposed to open in the Spring of 2009 and attract visitors (read: additional traffic).  The project includes the construction of a 30,000 square foot Sea Life Aquarium.  I might like to see that. Maybe we'll get some more good restaurants, although Summit Crossing already has some great places to lunch. 
I'm skeptical about the whole thing, but I'll try to post pictures of the progress.  It's actually very impressive so far.  And the baby geese are cute.