These are property taxes, not land taxes, unless the article is lumping them. A property tax doesn't provide incentives for more efficient use of land, on the contrary actually.
Even if they were land taxes, they would be way too small for a meaningful difference. Also the biggest effect would come from replacing income tax with land tax, as the most productive people would gain the most, and presumably invest the gain in whatever productive thing they're doing.
>For one, he took the opportunity risk of locking his liquid capital into a piece of land
>For two, he took on the appreciation risk
There's nothing valuable in risk. Your argument works even better for buying a piece of a rock for a million dollars and expecting profits, as the opportunity risk and appreciation risk are way higher than buying a piece of land.