Isn’t the reason those few districts have big “profits” because they are the central business district where all the people from the outlying areas with big “losses” come in to work and shop?
This feels like looking at a company by division and deciding that R&D and HR a make huge losses and all the profits are in sales.
The article discusses this in some detail. Some of the districts with high profits are “downtown” areas as you say. Some are “poor” or “bad” neighborhoods, contrary to your (and I suspect most people’s) intuition.
The article’s main thesis is that these poor areas have the best ROI for development.
In traditional cities people usually also live in the downtown.
The main issue is that free parking lots associated with big box stores are incredibly unproductive uses of land, and the tax value of the property reflects that.
This feels like looking at a company by division and deciding that R&D and HR a make huge losses and all the profits are in sales.