Two Way Hard Three | Las Vegas Casino & Design Blog

One thing that did happen in AC was that the new Water Club tower was closed during the week. This is a brand new resort at the best run casino by far in town. I could see this happening all over the strip. It is easy to conceive of a lot of closed hotel space on the strip, including City Center, Encore, and many of the multi tower resorts. I also expect lots of layoffs and union contract renegotiations by 2010. The numbers will get a lot worse before they get better.

MGM Mirage spent so much money on the "people mover" system (tram) for CityCenter, what would they do with the station at Bellagio if they decided to sell the Bellagio property? Do you really want to send your customers to your competitor for free?

Anthony, I don't think that's that big of a stretch. Granted, they didn't "build" the TI-Mirage tram, but they're now shuttling passengers to a "competitor for free." Remember, too, that MGM Grand originally shuttled countless tourists to Bally's, in the very early days of the Las Vegas Monorail, without so much as thinking about costs or losing customers. Also, the tram from Bellagio to Monte Carlo did shuttle customers from a Mirage/MGM Mirage property to a property that was operated by Mandalay Resort Group (although, it has to be fair to mention that it was a joint-venture between Mirage and Mandalay). I think the key one has to look at in the tram equation is the fact that, if Bellagio were to be sold, the tram would bring just as many customers to Aria as it would probably lose to Bellagio. People are going to be attracted to the fact that they won't have to walk along the strip as much, by being able to take the shuttle from Bellagio, and it would be more than likely that curiosity will entice them to depart the tram at Aria and explore the "newest place in town." However, as we all know this is really just hypothetical.

Great show... (and not just because you addressed my somewhat offbeat question!). Anyway, I totally agree that the showmanship aspect of Vegas has at least something to to with attracting visitors. I've been to Vegas quite a few times, and seen the Bellagio fountains enough that I almost have the choreography memorized.... but when the prices started dropping and I had the opportunity to get a lakeview room under $200, you better believe I took it. I lost a lot of money on their gaming floor in the process. Granted, if my room had been in disrepair or I had shoddy service that may have affected my inclination to return, but nothing could be further from the truth. We got a great room and top notch service despite the fact that my appearance is anything but that of a high roller. That said, I'd love to see Steve Wynn take the propery back.

I think the listener questions gave a lot more variety to the show and highlighted the knowledge of your panelists. They certainly do know more about Vegas and gaming than just balance sheets and corporate hierarchy.

Great show Hunter! Thanks for putting my question up for discussion! (I did mean fire"sale" not fire"rocket"...my bad)

You should do this Listener Questions segment more often. Since there are alot of questions from listeners and alot of discussion between those questions, I think you should from time-to-time dedicate one entire episode for questions (when there's not alot of gaming casino news to talk about). Like for this episode, one segment was dedicated to Gaming Numbers (which was interesting...) but if we omit that to some other episode, we would've had time for a few more questions.

Did Chuck stay at the California, when he was Downtown? Thank you all for a fine show. Can't wait for the next one!

Hello All,
Hunter - love the show. Keep up the great work. I'm planning a trip to New York and plan on stopping in Atlantic City for a night. I'm not a super big gambler, like to play a litte craps and some slots. Wanted to get opinions on a good place to stay. Right now it's between Harrahs Atlantic City, Caesars, and the Taj Majal. Looked at Borgata, but it's a litte to expensive for my blood. Suggestions are greatly appreciated.

Actionamar, I haven't been to Atlantic City since the year Trump Taj Mahal opened. I'm going back in May and decided against Borgata because of the room rates. A friend recommended Harrah's over any Trump property, and he said to try to get a room in the new Waterfront Tower.