Bitter competition between two Las Vegas billionaires has delighted at least one person: Oscar Goodman, mayor of the United States gambling mecca in the Western state of Nevada.
”It will look more and more like New York,” Goodman said, gushing over his city’s new skyline, sprouting like a weed from the desert amid a downpour of cash and a construction boom.
The growth spurt has attracted more and more people to live and work in Las Vegas, the fastest growing metropolis in the United States.
The legendary mayor, known affectionately both for his sometimes eccentric habits such as a love of gin and for landslide victories, will take great satisfaction when — with Las Vegas’ centennial just weeks away — he participates in Thursday’s opening of the most expensive casino in the world.
The spectacular hotel has been built right in the middle of the Las Vegas ”Strip” — the city’s main drag of more than 20 huge and elaborate hotels and casinos.
The man behind its construction, tycoon Steve Wynn (63) originally wanted to build the most expensive hotel in the Las Vegas sand with investments totalling $2,7-billion. But the recently completed Emirates Palace in Abu Dhabi, which cost $3-billion, snatched the claim away, though some reports in the US media have questioned whether the Emirates Palace truly deserves the title.
But at least Wynn, whose career has been a storybook rise from dishwasher to billionaire, can take some comfort in knowing that his new jewel will aggravate his arch enemy, 87-year-old Kirk Kerkorian.
The magazine Business Week described the casino as ”the revenge of Steve Wynn”. He gave it a name that equally appeals to gamblers and strokes his own ego: ”The Wynn” is emblazoned in flowing script on the side of the slightly curved, 50-storey building.
To staff the new hotel, Wynn hired away about 2 000 of Kerkorian’s workers, according to Business Week.
The casino and hotel were built on the site of the former Desert Inn, the hotel and casino where reclusive billionaire Howard Hughes set the course for the modern Las Vegas in the 1960s.
The city’s first generation of glittering casinos were built largely with questionable financing from the pension funds of Mafia-controlled labour unions, and infamous gangsters such as Bugsy Siegel called the shots.
Then, Hughes started investing in the city and the casinos. With encouragement and support from the US government, he and several serious investors gradually took possession of the city of gaudiness and glitz.
The days when mob thugs fought for dominance in Las Vegas have long since ended. Now, the struggles are between banks, investment firms and individual investors. Over the last decades Wynn and Kerkorian have waged bitter turf wars in the gambling paradise.
At the end of the 1980s, Wynn created a series of unique hotels beginning with the Mirage, which boasted the animal and magic act of Siegfried and Roy; Treasure Island, whose outdoor show featuring a realistic sea battle complete with booming canons and a sinking ship regularly attracts hundreds of spectators; and the elegant Bellagio, one of the few tastefully decorated Las Vegas hotels, complete with Italian stone mosaics and a synchronised water show.
But about five years ago, Wynn almost lost control of it all in a takeover bid by rival investors including Kerkorian, owner of the largest hotel in Las Vegas, the 5 000-room MGM.
Since then, Wynn’s new tactic has been to compete not in size but in luxury. Until recently, the secretive Wynn allowed no reporters into his prestigious project. What little he has revealed are dry facts and figures: the hotel has 2 716 rooms, suites and villas, none smaller than 58 square metres.
Rates will start at $298 for an overnight stay. Celebrity chefs have been hired to work in the hotel’s 18 restaurants. The Wynn’s more than 2 000-seat auditorium will be home to a show that features a lot of water. Other details remain tightly under wraps.
Original artworks by Picasso, Rembrandt and Chagall will be on display in the casino, which also will have the Strip’s only golf course, lushly laid out over 87ha and lavishly decorated with tropical plants. It features 100 000 new shrubs and bushes and a 12m high waterfall cascading into an artificial lake.
Naturally, gambling is at the heart of the operation. The casino will have 137 gambling tables and 1 960 slot machines and other electronic games to lure in gamblers and to give the casino a steady stream of cash.
”Don’t worry about making mistakes and destroying money,” Wynn was quoted by the US media as saying to his employees.
”The only thing that matters is that the people who come to this environment be happy and playful. It’s not about us. It’s about them.”
In any case, Goodman is pleased. He’s hoping that the simmering competition between the tycoons continues, which would add fuel to the building boom and perhaps help the city break last year’s record 37-million visitors. – Sapa-DPA