An American entrepreneur and visionary is planning a huge – and very expensive – religious theme park that will take years to complete and cost tens of millions of dollars.

The development will be a full-scale replica of ancient Jerusalem on a 700-acre site near Colorado Springs. The plan is to build Herod's Temple, the Antonia Fortress and Herod's Palace, with Jesus' crucifixion site, the High Priest's palace and other smaller buildings.

Michael Kinlaw writes of the project: "This isn't being built for profit. This isn't being built for anything other than the developer wants to build something for the people of America and the people of the world that is built so well that it will require little maintenance and still stand 2,000 years from now."

The Herod's Temple website says: "We believe it is time for the Jewish, Christian and Muslim faiths to have a place to visit in America where they can experience what it was like back in the days of ancient Jerusalem around the time of Jesus."

The project will take 15 years to complete and cost around $100 million. Kinlaw believes it will attract large numbers of visitors and produce vast revenues for the Colorado Springs area.

Among its features will be an underground parking area under Herod's Temple. The Antonia Fortress will eventually be turned into a shelter for homeless and poor people.

The developer says on his website: "I am not a religious person, or at least I wasn't until a few weeks ago. While sleeping a vision came to me and told me that I was going the wrong direction with my life. This higher power told me that I needed to spend the rest of my life serving a bigger cause and that I needed to build something larger than life. I was told exactly what to do, where to do it and how to do it. This project comes down to the old saying 'If we build it, they will come'."

He is raising funds to purchase the land and begin construction.