Las Vegas was ground zero when the housing bubble burst and the Great Recession took hold of the national and local economies, which brought the formerly booming construction trade to a halt in the Las Vegas Valley.
But along the Las Vegas Strip and elsewhere, recent, current, and future development plans are booming once again.
Caesars Entertainment recently completed its Linq retail development located between its recently acquired Flamingo and Linq, long-known as the Imperial Palace, casinos and topped by the world’s largest observation wheel, the High Roller.
Caesars continues developing its properties, including renovating the outdoor mall area alongside Harrah’s, while competitor MGM Resorts International has teamed with AEG to build the $375 million Las Vegas Arena, which is located near between the New York New York and Monte Carlo casinos and scheduled to open in Spring and can seat up to 18,000 for events.
The Las Vegas Convention Center is undergoing a 10-year, $2.5 billion makeover, which includes the recent purchase and pending demolition of the Riviera Casino to make way for more event space and give the convention center a presence on the north end of the Las Vegas Strip.
Across the street, Boyd Gaming’s former Echelon project is being reborn as the China-themed Resorts World Las Vegas, and further to the north, Downtown Las Vegas and the Fremont Street Experience have undergone a recent makeover, including a $350 million development of Container Park and other downtown areas by Zappos founder and CEO Tony Hsieh, the reopening of the former Lady Luck Casino, and other projects.
Pushing much of the development is a steady influx of tourism, with Las Vegas hotels reporting near-90 percent occupancy every month in 2015, after more than 41 million visitors came during 2014.
During 2009, when the Great Recession had taken hold of the nation’s economy, Las Vegas hit a recent low of about 36 million visitors, but the 2014 figure surpassed that by about five million, and local hotels reported a 13.2 percent rise in revenue per available room to $124.7 million in September and compared to a year earlier.
With tourism and economic activity up, more investors are willing to provide the capital necessary to complete many of the projects that stalled in Las Vegas, Global Gaming Group Vice President Michael Parks told the New York Times.
