If you haven't checked out a copy of Community Impact (http://www.impactnews.com/), do it. On October 1, 2008, I wrote a piece about business collaboration, which basically encouraged businesses to seek out properties simultaneously, and have several fill a new structure instead of having to market independently. Clusters of Austin starting to abound, and I was very pleased to see that Amy's Ice Cream and a few other businesses decided to stake out some land together. We have to become a less selfish city to thrive, and although developers market to and negotiate with businesses before they build, we have to take initiative and build communities while they build buildings.
Thanks to a bit of collaboration, that community will experience three things: 1) Property values will rise. Yes, this will lead to higher taxes, but it will also lead to even more neighborhood amenities and improvements. 2) Other businesses will see how quickly the space was filled, and may contact other businesses to fill the spaces in other buildings. Quite frankly, it's daunting to be the first business in a new development, so it's better to talk to other businesses and fill the space all at once because someone might back out, but the building wouldn't be empty in its first round. 3)Multiple businesses mean that employees have diverse skill sets, and that means that people in the area have opportunities to learn new skills to be employed in their own neighborhoods. Nothing makes employees more valuable than having diverse skills, and structures like these provide more opportunities for young people to have jobs and learn skills.
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