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Las Vegas mega-complex considered closing two of its hotels
The owners of the massive City Center casino complex in Las Vegas are still scrambling to figure out how to fix the 67-acre development's financial problems, The Wall Street Journal reports. Over the summer, executives of Dubai World and MGM Resorts International, which jointly own the project, studied and rejected closing two of the site's three hotels and the Viva Elvis Cirque du Soleil show, according to documents reviewed by the Journal.
Those documents also showed that the partners have also outlined a plan to seek relief on the terms of the complex's $1.8 billion loan, which requires the joint venture to earn far more cash than currently seems feasible. If they can't renegotiate the terms, City Center could be in default on the loan as early as mid-2011.
“It is the duty of a board to look at everything,” says Jim Murren, ceo of MGM Resorts, told the Journal. “We throw out many ideas to see if they're feasible, productive or destructive.… I'm proud of what we did. We have cut costs in a variety of ways at City Center.”
Murren attributes much of the development's woes to the slower-than-expected recovery nationally and in Las Vegas, and to the time it takes for a new resort to gain traction. But the project's unusual design and huge scale have produced other complaints, say casino insiders and frequent visitors.
MGM is working on fixing some of the problems, such as dark lighting in the Aria's casino. According to the documents and Murren, the company also plans to change the decor in the buffet upstairs, which is “too cold,” at a cost of $1 million. It has also spent $5 million to plant more trees and plants at Aria, and it has reconstructed the high-stakes gamblers room.
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