A real estate investment firm owned by Bill Gates recently spend $80 million on a massive chunk of land in Arizona to develop it into a smart city.
Arizona-based Belmont Partners, one of the investment firms of Gates bought 25000 acres of land in Tonopah, around 50 miles west of Phoenix to create the City of the Future.
The smart city will be called Belmont. The term smart city implies an urban region that is highly advanced in terms of overall infrastructure, sustainable real estate, communications and market viability.
“Belmont will create a forward-thinking community with a communication and infrastructure spine that embraces cutting-edge technology, designed around high-speed digital networks, data centers, new manufacturing technologies and distribution models, autonomous vehicles and autonomous logistics hubs,” Belmont Partners said in a news release.
The community “will transform a raw, blank slate into a purpose-built edge city built around a flexible infrastructure model,” according to Belmont Properties.
Belmont would accommodate around 3800 acres for commercial and office space, 470 acres for public schools and 80,000 acres for residential units.
Arizona Technology Council’s Ron Schott said that “Bill Gates is known for innovation” and that he selected a right place and purchasing the land is a smart move. The location of the smart city will be near the newly opened I-11 freeway which will expand its route through Belmont to Las Vegas.
“Finally Arizona’s getting recognized for being a place for innovation,” added Schott.
Currently, there’s no word on when the construction of the Gates’ smart city will start. Bill Gates is now an ex-CEO of Microsoft and is no longer the world’s richest man although he is still in the top 10 list.
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