Two local transportation experts gave differing opinions on the feasibility of light rail passenger service in Las Vegas.
The Las Vegas Sun recently queried Bruce Woodbury, the former chairman of the Nevada Regional Transportation Commission, and urban planning expert Robert Lang, who is co-director of Brookings Mountain West and an expert on Las Vegas transportation infrastructure.
Woodbury says recent proposals to spend about $400 million to extend the Las Vegas Monorail line some 1.5 miles to connect with McCarran International Airport would not have the intended effect of easing traffic congestion.
Instead, he says the monorail and a proposed elevated expressway from the airport to the Las Vegas would make it easier for more cars to travel to the Strip and increase the amount of traffic and congestion.
Woodbury also says pedestrian foot traffic would increase, as light rail passengers try to get from their hotels to the monorail line.
Woodbury says Las Vegas developments are too spread out, and a multimodal approach to solving the city’s traffic congestion is best. He says a light-rail system would costs up to $125 million per mile to build, and even more to maintain and operate.
He also says Las Vegas hotel owners don’t want to increase room taxes on their customers to pay for light rail, particularly with other projects also looking to increase room taxes to fund them, including a proposed 65,000-seat domed stadium.
Lang sees light rail differently, though, and says it recent developments, such as the Park at the New York-New York casino, make it more feasible for passengers to get on and off a light rail system without increasing foot traffic or congestion.
Lang also says many of the younger visitors Las Vegas resorts want to attract in the coming years are more open to using light rail systems than current traditional Las Vegas tourists, who average nearly 48 years in age.
Lang also says Las Vegas faces strong competition from Orlando and other U.S. tourist destinations, and Orlando is working on incorporating light rail into an improved transportation infrastructure system there.
He says space in Las Vegas mostly has been taken, and there isn’t more room for more cars coming to the city, despite the airport being located only a short distance from the Las Vegas Strip and the city’s 150,000 hotel rooms.
