I'll add my perspective, along with shooting Illinois sports, I've also joined a couple C-U History groups and do a lot of photography for them. For the last 10 years I've been documenting Champaign, Urbana, Campus and Savoy in pictures. Not only learning a ton about C-U, but I've been in area's that I would have never been in. Midtown was an area that I very rarely ever ventured into. Recent developments are increasing Midtown from an somewhat unsightly area, into a potentially really nice area. Lots of room for more improvements over the next few years.
This tie's into the potential Hockey arena. The area where the new arena would go, along with the new hotel and office-condo's would liven up a basically dead area. If this deems successful then the unsightly area's in Midtown hopefully would be attractive for new development. That's why for many who follow city grow etc. this could really be a game changer for Champaign.
On occasion get to talk with City planners and developers, and everyone is watching this closely, so many other things development wise could be triggered if this happens. Oh and adding Hockey, I get to shoot another sport!.