The credit crisis continues to deepen. Yet another large development has secured financing. This time it’s the mammoth CityCenter project in Las Vegas.

MGM Mirage said Monday that it completed the first stage of its $3 billion financing package for CityCenter, a $9.2 billion Las Vegas Strip casino project being developed with Dubai World.

MGM said it had secured a $1.8 billion senior bank credit facility that will mature in April 2013.

CityCenter has received addition commitment letters of more than $500 million, which executives said will be added to the facility once completed.

CityCenter - which MGM Mirage (nyse: MGM - news - people ) officials have called the most expensive private commercial development in U.S. history - is expected to include six high-rise towers with a 4,000-room hotel-casino, condominiums, boutique hotels and a retail, dining and entertainment complex.

A few months ago we linked to an item from Boston about how the mayor wanted greater assurances from developers about financing before giving the green light to large projects. At the time, the Filene’s redevelopment was stalled because of lack of financing.

It appears that even amid the credit crisis, the project was able to secure financing. The big question, of course, is what the terms are. They are not described in the story.

After weeks of uncertainty about the struggling project, developer John B. Hynes III and partner Vornado Realty Trust have secured financing to proceed with construction on the 1.25 million-square-foot mixed-used site, which will include retail shops, condominiums, a hotel, and offices in the historic department store building and a new 38-story tower next to it.

The head of the company building the project, John F. Fish of Suffolk Construction Co., said he was told by the developers to ramp up construction work because the team had locked in its final pieces of funding in recent days.

“We’ve been given the green light to move forward, and the financing has been validated, so we’re in good shape,” Fish said. His firm has even bought the structural steel for the complex.

The project has been in the works for a while.

On Friday, I linked to a screed about the future of shopping centers. A blog called The Sledgehammer has written a response entitled In Defense of the Traditional Shopping Mall. The post is labeled “Part 1″ so I’ll keep an eye out for any future addenda to Lutz’s post.

Contrary to what the article seems to imply, there are no truly dead malls in the Seattle area. For a mall to be truly dead, it has to be either completely or almost completely abandoned. Sure, there are a number of malls that are underperforming with high vacancy rates, but even at Totem Lake(the Seattle Metro area’s current poster child for dead malls,) most of the upper mall area remains occupied at this time with stable tenants, several of which have been there as long as the upper mall has existed. In fact, Denny’s Pet World in the upper mall has been there since day 1, and is celebrating their 34th anniversary this weekend. They opened in a different space (in what used to be the “mall” portion of the upper mall and is now the Guitar Center store) than they are located in currently, but they were there on day 1. If you count mergers and name changes, the Big 5 Sporting Goods store (which originally opened as SportsWest, another Pay and Save brand) has been around for just as long.

Here’s just a taste of some of the interesting commentary the Retail Traffic staff heard on the floor of ICSC’s RECon show.

“With the way the economy is going right now, I’ve noticed retailers are more aggressive about negotiating their exit strategies,” says an attorney with Cox Castle Nicholson, a Los Angeles-based commercial real estate law firm. “They don’t want to get stuck if the economy continues to slide. In that case, something that’s a good compromise situation for the landlord is if a retailer has sales below a specific amount for a given period of time, then the retailer can get out of the lease. They can’t just leave their space without good cause.”… “Most retailers are now looking at that bottom 5 percent to 7 percent of their real estate portfolio to see if they can [cut costs],” says Al Williams, of Excess Space Retail Services, Inc., a Lake Success, N.Y.-based consulting firm. “Wall Street is not going to look down on that right now, so they think it’s a good time.”… Retail developers in search of replacement tenants can now turn to Creme de la Creme, Inc., a Greenwood Village, Colo.-based developer and operator of early childhood development centers. The firm is currently looking for out parcel sites at high-end lifestyle centers in the suburbs of major cities. Most of its buildings measure approximately 21,000 square feet. “We are attracting 600 people to the center every day, twice a day,” says Bruce T. Karpas, Creme de la Creme’s president and CEO. “Plus, we are not looking to be right in the middle of the property, so we are not taking away the land a retailer would want.” The company, which operates 20 centers at present, will open three additional properties in 2008, followed by eight to 10 centers in 2010….Glimcher Ventures Southwest, a Scottsdale, Ariz.-based developer, is rolling out a new concept called “The Boulevard,” which will combine retail offerings with a wide mix of restaurants and entertainment venues in an open-air, pedestrian-friendly setting. The first of the projects, a 250,000 square foot center in Surprise Point, Ariz. scheduled for completion later this year, will be followed by three similar developments in the Phoenix area and, eventually, locations in California, Nevada and New Mexico. David J. Glimcher describes the concept as a “Disneyesque experience.” more

This is great news for Related. It’s much more positive than its other recent news when it announced it was postponing construction of the second phase of its CityNorth project in Arizona by a year.

Still, overall Related has some really interesting projects in the works when you consider this deal with CityNorth and its massive Grand project in Los Angeles. Add to that TimeWarner Center in New York and you’re talking about an impressive collection of urban mixed-use projects.

The Kingsbridge Armory, once the world’s largest military drill hall, will be turned over to a private corporation for a $310 million makeover into a massive retail center intended to jumpstart the North Bronx economy, city officials are announcing today.

Manhattan-based Related Companies won the project, ending a frustrating 12-year effort to find a new use for the historic armory, which was turned over to the city by the National Guard amid military cost-cutting and the escalating expense of repairing and maintaining the huge structure.

Under Related’s plan, the 575,000-square-foot site will become home to an “anchor” department store, up to 35 smaller shops, a number of restaurants and a movie multiplex.

Atlantic Yards is being delayed some more, especially some of the components that look to be risker in this economic environment.

“It may hold up the office building,” the developer, Bruce C. Ratner, said in a recent interview. “And the bond market may slow the pace of the residential buildings.”

Mr. Ratner, chief executive of Forest City Ratner, did not specify the kinds of delays possible, but suggested that construction could be put off for years. His comments are his first public indication that the darkening economy has slowed the ambitious project, spanning 22 acres at the intersection of Flatbush and Atlantic Avenues.

The developer did say he was confident about starting construction on a $950 million basketball arena for the Nets by the end of the year. The arena was to be surrounded by the office tower, known as Miss Brooklyn, and three residential buildings in the first phase of the project.

Link.

There’s a thought-provoking post over at ULI’s blog, The Ground Floor, that takes up the question of whether denser developments breed more crime.

The story is in response to a new study that shows that “residents of high-rise apartments are much more likely to be victims of crime — specifically street crime. The effect remains similar after statistically adjusting for poverty, demographics and public housing: It’s the height of the building itself that matters.” The report was featured in a Washington Post story.

So what are the best ways to design compact, densely populated, walkable communities which are attractive, safe and lively? One thing clearly needed is enough housing so people live in the community; this is what creates the “24/7″ communities which have been shown to be most successful over time. What are the best ways to do this while reducing crime and enhancing public safety?

Population density brings “eyes on the street” which generally reduces crime. It is better to walk around at night where other people are also walking, not down lonely alleys. More population density also supports more stores and activities — movies, restaurants, and the like — which bring lights, life and more people. One of the biggest mistakes of many new suburban town centers is the failure to include enough housing, with the result that there are not enough people to support the stores and restaurants needed to keep the center economically and socially vital.

The only way to bring in population density is to build up. Single family homes, even town homes lined up side by side with party walls, do not give the density in a walkable range to support stores and services and have eyes on the street. It takes apartments and condos to do that. This means at least mid-rise construction, and in some places true high rise buildings.

The Wall Street Journal today has a look at the ongoing wrangling to turn the former Drake Hotel in New York City into a new mixed-use tower.

The highly leveraged Mr. Macklowe is developing an office-and-retail tower on the former location of the Swissotel’s Drake Hotel on Park Avenue in midtown Manhattan, which he bought last year for $418 million. If he can get the $2 billion project under way — especially with a big-name anchor tenant under lease — it could create some breathing room on his balance sheet while he deals with other debt-laden projects.

To pull that off, though, Mr. Macklowe needs to enlarge the development site by also buying a row of small retail buildings that face East 57th Street. However, so far he has been unable to secure all of those buildings, and people familiar with the situation say the glitch lies at least with one building: 42 E. 57th St., home to Turnbull & Asser, a high-end men’s clothier owned by Mr. al Fayed.

Mr. Macklowe has been thwarted because Turnbull & Asser has a long-term lease, and the owner doesn’t want to relocate. “We are here to stay,” said Paul Collins, chief financial officer for Turnbull & Asser, who declined to comment further.

Speculation about the fate of the site of the old convention center in Washington D.C. has been rampant for years. It finally looks like a deal is in place.

Hines and Archstone-Smith are the main developers of what will be an $850 million blockbuster project.

Mayor Adrian M. Fenty and a commercial development team have agreed on an $850 million deal to build retail shops, apartments and condominiums on public land where the city’s former convention center once stood.

The development will be built on two-thirds of the 10-acre parcel, which is the largest undeveloped property in the District’s urban core south of Massachusetts Avenue.

The mayor, in a news conference yesterday morning at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center, said the project would become the District’s new retail center.

“This project will be — in almost anybody’s definition — the heart and soul of downtown,” Fenty said. “A live, work and play environment unlike anywhere else in Washington, D.C.”

The development team of Hines and Archstone-Smith plans to build two office buildings, two condominium buildings and two apartment buildings on the land, with construction slated to begin in January 2009. About 20 percent of the housing will be reserved for low- and middle-income tenants. The developers plan to complete the first buildings in 2011.

On Monday, Related Cos., the developer behind the Time Warner Center in New York, said it had received a capital infusion of nearly $1.4 billion from companies including the investment arm of the Abu Dhabi government and Goldman Sachs.

At a time when the credit markets are still on the couch, the deal gives the private developer a fattened purse to fund future development.

Goldman and MSD Capital bought 7.5% equity stakes in Related, while an affiliate of Abu Dhabi’s Mubadala Development the Olayan Group and an unnamed company made debt investments of an unspecified amount. The companies will invest with Related in future projects, the developer said.

At Forbes.