The Antiplanner has never visited Memphis, so when I was watching a video of the flooding in Memphis, I was surprised to see a huge pyramid. “Looks like a government boondoggle to me,” I said.
Flickr photo by Exothermic.
Sure enough. The Pyramid Arena opened in 1991 after being built at a cost of $65 million which was “publicly financed” by the city of Memphis and Shelby County. It is supposedly the sixth-largest pyramid in the world. Significantly, four of the five larger pyramids (all in Egypt) were also government boondoggles, the only exception being the Luxor Hotel in Las Vegas. “Though it was a controversial architectural undertaking at the time,” says one web site, “most Memphians have come to accept, if not appreciate, the Pyramid.”
