Actually, the neighborhoods around Hialeah are not "rough" (not by local standards, anyway) --they are working class neighborhoods, with most of the signs in Spanish, which is enough to freak out the average all-American doughball. It is basically the same neighborhood as around CD, just in Espanol.
Most of Hialeah is working class, and it and neighboring Medley (to the south) are packed with light industrial businesses and warehouses, with a lot of import/export businesses. It is not really an area ripe for redevelopment and gentrification. When Hialeah gets its casino, there could be some improvement in the very immediate area but, unlike the old days, it's crowd will be largely from the central and western parts of Miami-Dade County, most especially when gaming is established toward the beach. People from Boca, Broward, Aventura and Miami Beach who have no problem going to GP are NOT going to Hialeah. Period. So there is a very definite limit to the market--it will be largely Latin, and almost all from central and western Miami-Dade. There is no way to reinvent the old days from that. Brunetti can make a lot of money as a casino on that model, but horse racing can never be more than a sideshow.
I've tried to explain this here before, having lived here for most of 50 years, but everybody else seems to think they know better. OK, whatever.
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