Narrated by Neil, this tells the story of Chicago's Block 37, a $1 billion hole in the ground. Block 37 started out as a building project which was designed to bring new life to the heart of Chicago. It attracted some of the best, brightest and most brazen developers, city planners and architects in America, but the heroic plans were overwhelmed by a powerful mixture of greed and money and the plan came spectacularly to grief, destroyed by the devastating property crash of the 1980s - leaving Block 37 a derelict site.

Imagine Times Square, Piccadilly Circus or the Champs Elysee bulldozed, boarded up and derelict. Well go to Chicago and that's what you've got: a gold-plated hole in the ground.

This is the story of a $1 billion dollar project that went belly up, leaving little more than a derelict block, accumulated debts of $100 million and shattered dreams. Block 37 attracted some of the best, brightest and most brazen developers, city planners and architects in America. They poured their energies into creating a world class project, secured millions of dollars of financing and hired internationally renowned architect Helmut Jahn.

This huge deal put together by big-money consortium FJV would have brought new life to the heart of Chicago and fulfilled part of the masterplan for Chicago's downtown conceived thirty years earlier by controversial Chicago Mayor Richard J Daley. But FJV were blown out of the water by the 1980's property crash and the legacy of Mayor Daley's highly questionable deals.

Block 37 on one level is simply a blank eyesore, but on another this sad vacancy tells us not only about the fate of Chicago but of cities round the world. The Works speaks to all the major players to show how their overwhelming ambition, delusions of grandeur and heroic plans were overcome by a powerful mix of greed, money and the harsh reality of the modern city.

Based on Here's The Deal by Ross Miller 1996:

"'Here's the deal' they all told each other, while the booming eighties steamed ahead. But in the end, when boom went to bust, when credit dried up and downtown office space became the single thing the American city had too much of, then the 'deal' was all there was."

This information was taken from www.bbc.co.uk - Check it out for more details.