MGM Resorts will spend $100M in Las Vegas to “transform land along the Strip and surrounding the New York New York and Monte Carlo resorts into an outdoor plaza and pedestrian mall with trendy shops, restaurants and a public park,” with the plaza serving "as a gateway into a 20,000-seat sports arena, which the company will build behind the two resorts with national arena developer AEG,” according to a front-page piece by Howard Stutz of the LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL. Some initial construction “has begun, and the company expects the retail and restaurant complex to open” by early ‘14. The arena budget is “separate and not part of the plaza development.” MGM Resorts and AEG are “requesting proposals for an architect for the arena, which will include designs and budgeting.” MGM Resorts Chair & CEO Jim Murren said that the development will “take part in phases ... with the park and arena as the final pieces with a 2016 completion date.” The arena will “allow MGM Resorts to offer more events, including professional and college basketball and hockey games, that sometimes have to be turned away from the company’s two other Strip venues: the 17,000-seat MGM Grand Garden and the 12,000-seat Mandalay Bay Events Center.” Murren: “We will be able to accommodate more acts and sporting events than ever before” (LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL, 4/18). Murren said, “We turn away literally dozens of concerts (and) entertainment events every year here in Las Vegas. We literally cannot accommodate the demand. We own two arenas already ... so we believe if we build a larger state-of-the-art arena … with the powerhouse of AEG, we’ll be able to bring more events, more people and that of course will help the home team and we have most of the resorts here” (“Squawk on the Street,” CNBC, 4/18).
SIDELINED PLAYER: In Las Vegas, Alan Snel wrote Silverton Casino President and Majestic Realty point man Craig Cavileer “can’t understand why UNLV dumped Majestic on March 26 as its private partner” for the proposed $900M, 60,000-seat UNLV Now stadium project. Cavileer said, “Somewhere along the line someone disagreed with (the project). I don’t know where it came from.” Although UNLV “terminated the stadium partnership with Majestic, the development company still has a toe in the project because the university is required to offer it the right of first refusal for two years if UNLV wants to build with another private partner.” Cavileer said that Murren “suggested the stadium be open-air, not domed.” He also said that Las Vegas Sands Chair & CEO Sheldon Adelson, Station Casinos co-Owners Lorenzo and Frank Fertitta and Wynn Resorts Chair & CEO Steve Wynn “all liked the stadium project” (LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL, 4/17).
