LA River plan driving land prices up

[LOS ANGELES] Ben Stapleton frames the shot with his hands like a movie director, sharing his vision of a junkyard he's trying to sell for US$3.5 million. He sees artist workspaces, retail shops and apartments with Los Angeles skyline views, steps from a riverfront oasis.

Right now the river of his dreams is the concrete flood channel where an 18-wheeler chased Arnold Schwarzenegger on a Harley in Terminator 2: Judgment Day, one of the movies that used the 60-metre ditch to depict industrial bleakness. A US Army Corps of Engineers plan to return the Los Angeles River to a more natural state would cost US$1 billion and has speculators circling even before the funding's in place.

"The private money is already moving," said Mr Stapleton, a vice-president at commercial property brokerage Jones Lang LaSalle. "They're looking for opportunities. It's the private money that's going to make the vision happen."