MGM Resorts International will be reopening the Mirage in the next several days, leaving Park MGM as the Las Vegas-based casino giant’s only Strip resort to remain dark.
The 3,000-room Mirage has begun taking room reservations and will be opened to the public on August 27, MGM said.
No timetable was announced for a resumption of business at Park, which had been eyed as a host hotel for the National Hockey League if Las Vegas had been selected as one of the two locations for the season’s restart and playoffs. That changed when the city’s recent surge in Covid-19 infections caused the league to opt for Toronto and Edmonton, Alberta, instead.
Including Park and its adjoining NoMad hotel, 11 Las Vegas casinos remain shuttered. The others are: Caesars Entertainment’s Cromwell and Planet Hollywood on the Strip and the off-Strip Rio; Red Rock Resorts’ locals venues Texas Station, Fiesta Henderson, Fiesta Rancho and the off-Strip Palms; and Boyd Gaming’s Main Street Station in Downtown Las Vegas, Eastside Cannery on the Boulder Strip and the Eldorado in the suburb of Henderson.
Nevada’s gaming industry reopened June 4 after a 78-day lockdown, but absent any convention trade, the lifeblood of the Las Vegas market, particularly on the Strip, analysts don’t expect visitation to even approach pre-pandemic levels before the second quarter of next year, if then.
As it stands, weekend hotel occupancy on the Strip has recovered to around 70 percent, but midweek has stalled at around 30 percent on average. Some resorts, Las Vegas Sands’ Palazzo, for one, have stopped taking midweek reservations.
