Strip...Mall?

-

Vegas it is a changin', and not, in my opinion, for the the better.

As I've stated here before, I go to Vegas mainly for the “Vegas-ness” of the place. I haven't done a ton of traveling, but from what I've seen Vegas is unlike any other city in the US. It traditionally was built around adult pleasure, a sort or slackening of the rules of normal US cities. You can smoke anywhere. You can drink anywhere. You can gamble anywhere. Normal moral codes are relaxed or done away with altogether. Hedonism, sloth, a sense of adventure and even a tinge of potential danger are encouraged and hinted at.

You can find all these elements in other American cities, but not all in one place, and not as the established norm. You can GO to a seedy local strip club, you can GO to the one halfway decent non-chain restaurant in town, you can GO to an Indian Casino 20 miles out of town to gamble, you can hope a decent concert or show are coming to your town or the one across the way. Or you can book a partially subsidized plane flight and get a cheap room in a great hotel and see all of the same things inside any of a number of single resorts on the Strip.

That tradition of providing adults with original, adult attractions seems to be breaking down, at the hands of real estate consultants inside the mega-corporations that run the bulk of the Strip. The focus now seems to be on maximizing $$ per square foot of property. Going, going gone are distinctive frontages at Monte Carlo, NYNY, Bally's, and TI. In their place? Mainly retail and chain restaurants. The Linq, from LVB to the High Roller, retail and chain restaurants. The Boulevard between NYNY and Monte Carlo will be a trail of food/retail leading to another huge indoor arena in a town full of indoor arenas. Tropicana is turning its whole Strip facing frontage into shops/retail. Throw in new drugstores at Casino Royale, one in the incoming retail/food frontage at TI and one on the corner of Sahara across from the SLS, because what the Strip needs is more convenience stores. Add all this to the existing Crystals, Miracle Mile, Forum Shops and myriad other smaller mall-ish places on the Strip.

Look, I understand why the bean counters are doing this. Retail/food lease revenue is the gift that keeps giving, as long as the crowds keep coming to be able to support all those shops/restaurants. But therein lies the rub. If the Strip turns into nothing but a glorified LED covered stripmall, will the people who support the town keep coming?

Will I?

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

I'm Posh, Ya Bish.

-
Image
This is going to be a baller-ass vacation. Private planes, 1100 sq ft suites in a 5-star resort, steaks and high-end sashimi. We be living  good  on the 55th birthday trip. It all starts with flying semi-private on JSX in and out. Flown with them a couple times before, SO much less hassle than dealing with the fucking major airports. Private terminal, no TSA, no bag worries, big cushy seats, free drinks. Hopping on in OAK and will just UBER it to and from. So much more evolved than being basically violated by TSA in the normal airports.  Then on arrival in LAS it's in the taxi and over to Resorts World. I have added early check-in to standby, so hopefully I can just roll straight up to the room at 1:30p. It's the One Bedroom Suite at the Conrad, 1100 sq ft of lovely at the north end of the strip. No resort hopping this time, one room, one unpack, one relax.  Trying to think back, pretty sure this will be the biggest room I've ever had in Vegas, I think Encore or Dela...
Read more

JuneLyBies. June/July Freebies and Discounts.

-
Image
A decent haul, y'all. -6 nights at Mandalay Bay Las Vegas. $412 all in. Would be $1409 all in with the best website rate. Saved $997 over rack rate. -$30 Freeplay and $50 Resort Credit included in the deal. $80 value. -Roughly $160 in Freeplay from MGM by the time I get to town, $160 value. Total overhead saved = $1237. Not nearly an all timer but not bad for a holiday week trip. Would have been $700 more had I stayed at Fontainebleau as originally planned so a bit of frugality after the baller April trip.  1 month.
Read more

Pointses.

-
Image
Got a nice little Resort Credit bump today, from an old job.  While I was with Kit/Ro in late '22 to early '23 I racked up some Marriot points while I was flirting with the move to Phoenix. Now that Marriot and MGM are bumping uglies, I was able to convert those (otherwise useless) points into MGM Rewards points. It turned into about $190 in credit, which, thanks old job! That means with what I already had earned, I will have over $230 available for the Xmas trip. Hello, Xmas dinner on Marriot, and one other dinner too. That's on top of the $50 I will have from the Aria booking package, and the potential $100 RC bump from getting to Gold on the trip, if I do. 3 nice meals (at least) inbound. We eatin'  good  for Xmas, y'all. The Xmas-freebies post coming up this year will be tidy.
Read more