Knight Concert Hall

Years behind schedule and more than $100 million over budget, Miami-Dade's Carnival Center for the Performing Arts has opened for business. The soaring complex straddling Biscayne Boulevard in downtown Miami includes a 2,400-seat opera house, 2,200-seat concert hall and 200-seat studio theater. Officials call it a vital component to Miami's emergence as a world-class city.

"This is certainly something very special," says Carnival Center President and CEO Michael Hardy.

So is the price. Touted a decade ago as a $139-million project, the Cesar Pelli-designed center's costs escalated greatly following a dramatic change in scope, design and construction flaws, contractor squabbles and a worker shortage. Final bill: $460 million, much of that coming from a county tax on hotel rooms.

But operating costs are another matter. With local philanthropists tapped out by the construction costs, few private dollars remain for a planned operating endowment. Hardy says the center will rely on about $4 million annually in public money to meet its $25-million budget.

Carnival Center "There are only about 30 performing arts centers in the country, perhaps another 30 elsewhere in the world," says Carnival Center President and CEO Michael Hardy. "This is certainly something very special."

Yet few question the center's value as an economic catalyst. Nearby real estate prices are skyrocketing as a booming arts district has emerged within this long-neglected swath of warehouses and vacant commercial buildings. Upscale high-rise condos are under construction nearby, and one block south plans are under way for pricey new homes for the Miami Art Museum and the Miami Museum of Science.

"Obviously, running the center will be one of our challenges -- you never really know what it costs until you're into it for a while," says Hardy. "But I think the promises of a world-class facility like this are clear to everyone."