"Along a two-mile stretch of railroad track in Miami, one 100-foot slice sparkles with clean rails, shiny rocks, agave plants and new white fencing.
Beyond that tidy patch of tidiness, to either side, lay signs of inner-city decay: stacks of rubble, tin and plastic cans, twisted piping, needles, sleeping vagrants.
Property owner Brad Knoefler, who took a leap of faith eight years ago by spending $1.2 million to turn a decaying Overtown warehouse into a stunning Soho-type building of lofts along the tracks , helped spiff up the shiny stretch.
Now, working with fellow property owners and developers, Knoefler is pressing myriad government agencies for $1.3 million to create a greenway along the larger rail corridor that knifes through a historic but bedraggled stretch of Miami."
