[thewebguyd]

Zoning is only part of it. If a plot is already zoned industrial, but is empty, you still need to get the permitting for building construction, utility hookup, waste water & stormwater, environmental inspections, etc.

It varies from state to state (and city specific laws), but to go from empty land to productive asset can take several years.

[cucumber3732842]

Or better yet, farmer Johnson lets his D rate hay plot grow over because he never really thought it was worth it and the son that was managing that plot left for college.

Someone buys the plot 30yr later. They can't clear it and farm it without spending a quarter mil on environmental permitting because the government sees it as a pre-existing forest and the drainage ditch farmer Johnson's dad dug back in 1988 is now a stream (i.e. protected wetland) so they want the new owner to get the same permits that someone bulldozing a swamp for a strip mall would.

You see comparable fact patterns on every axis of regulation.