Thanks to the EB-5 money-for-visa program, many wealthy Chinese investors are helping revive one of San Francisco's most ambitious development projects, a project that will help lift one of the city's worst neighborhoods out of poverty.

The $8 billion, 314-hectare Shipyards project in San Francisco's southeastern impoverished black neighborhoods of Hunters Point and Candlestick Point lay dormant for years because of lack of funding.

"The idea for this project began nearly 20 years ago," said David Satterfield, a spokesman for Lennar Urban, the developer of Shipyards. "Planning involved much community input and governmental and environmental approvals. The US financial crisis from 2007 to 2010 slowed the project and EB-5 money has helped get it restarted."