I’m stuck at home. Again. Waiting for the floor guys to show up at 9. Again. It’s 9:53. Again.
It wouldn’t be so bad if this wasn’t the fourth day that I’ve been stuck in the house and it’s one of those “rare” completely sunny Saturday mornings… but it is, so it’s that bad. I’m so bored with TV that I’m actively reading blogs, which I rarely do on the weekend.
Saw an interesting post about how MGM Mirage has started work on their City Center project. This is the new collection of hotels/condos in Vegas that will “connect” the Monte Carlo to the Bellagio, replacing the Holiday Inn, the Boardwalk, the Polo Towers, and [I think] the Jockey Club. All old school hotels but not good old school hotels. Like Caesars is old school but they’ve been enhanced and remodelled over the years; they are kicking ass once again.
The neat thing to me was that the post about City Center pointed to Wikipedia which in turn had a bunch of information and pictures about the project. What was even more interesting to me was the section underneath that which has links for nearly all of the resorts on the Strip.
After clicking around the links I’m… well, I’m sorta in shock. I shouldn’t be, but I am just the same.
My first trip to Vegas was in 1996. Presented software at the launch of Windows CE 1.0 at a Mirage conference room, accidentally walked into Bill Gates at 12:30am (literally walked into him: I was sick and it was 3:30am according to my body clock) and chatted up David Cole in a cab line. In ’96, Vegas was no stranger to the mega-resort: the Mirage had been open since 1989 and every six to eight months a new resort was opening. It was, in my own opinion, the crossroads of old Vegas and new Vegas. The height of the “first wave” of mega-resorts when a lot of the old resorts were still open for business.
Caesars had yet to remodel, so their dark rooms, mirrors everywhere, and cheesy gold accents were still running amuck. Circus Circus was still a “premier” location, even if it did smell like kids and piss. The Westward Ho [motel] – landmark since the mid 60’s – was charging $299/night for that year’s Comdex. Sahara, The Riviera, Stardust, The New Frontier, The Aladdin, The Tropicana, and The Sands: all open. Sure the Dunes and the Tangiers were gone, but they were the only big ones to go. The new kids on the block were Treasure Island, Luxor, Excalibur, and Mirage. Bally’s [in the original MGM Grand buildings], the Flamingo, the Las Vegas Hilton [formerly the International], and MGM Grand were neither old or new at this point, but given their “non-themed” persona, they weren’t really mega-resorts either. And yeah, I knew all of this before going to Wikipedia: I’ve forgotten more about Vegas than most people ever want to know in the first place.
Between my first visit and now a lot had changed. The Aladdin was demolished and rebuilt. Caesers has been completely redone and added a few towers. The Sands was replaced by The Venetian. Desert Inn was replaced by The Wynn. The Fashion Showcase mall as quadrupled in size. Comdex is dead and gone, but the convention center itself has tripled in size. The Bally’s-MGM Grand monorail now connects the Hilton to the MGM Grand (and costs money to ride on). The Monte Carlo to TI tram seems to have disappeared. Harrah’s has grown, the Imperial Palace has a premier poker room, Bally’s grew a habit trail, New York, New York and the Paris appeared along with the Bellagio and Mandalay Bay. 9/11 halted all new development for a few years but even that couldn’t halt Vegas for long.
Notice some hotels not mentioned there, that I noticed during my first trip to the Vegas in the 90’s?
That’s what I was reading about this morning… I knew the chunk of misc. hotels were going between NY, NY and Monte Carlo, especially after MGM and Mirage Corp merged. It just makes sense in a way: there’s a limited amount of space on the Strip and the hotels cleared out were glorified motels. But then I read about The New Frontier – part of it is going to Trump’s for his condos and the rest for a new place called Montreux (2010) which will feature jazz. Jazz? Jazz. The developer was originaly going to go with a San Francisco theme [lame! SanFran is like 400 miles from Vegas!] but changed his mind post-9/11. I think the boy needs some guidance, frankly: both don’t sound very good, but well… at least it’s new construction. The Stardust – one of the few hotels that kept its original building and built around it – is getting replaced by Echelon Place (2010). Circus Circus is under review; the theme will stay, but since it hasn’t been made over since the late 60’s, it will probably be a tear down and rebuild. The Trop was recently bought – no plans have been announced for it yet… since that hasn’t had a remodel since the mid 80’s, it’ll probably disappear.
Yeah, I’ve said it before, that Vegas changes on a yearly basis… all of these plans shouldn’t surprise me, but in some ways it does. I guess I took the older hotels for granted. After all, they had been there for so long and they shouldn’t have survived the first round of mega-resource expansion, but they did. I sorta expected them to keep defying the odds and be around for as long as the city was there. Swing and a miss on that.
The King is dead; long live the King – let the second wave begin!
FYI – it’s now 10:51. The tossers just got here! Grr.