http://www.klas-tv.com/Global/story.asp?S=4319566
Edward Lawrence, Reporter
Jan 5, 2006, 02:07 PM PST
Big changes are coming to the north end of the Las Vegas Strip. The Stardust will shut down in March of 2007. It will be torn down to make way for a new $4 billion development called Echelon Place. Channel 8 Eyewitness News first broke the story a year ago that Boyd Gaming had plans for the site.
The Stardust opened in July of 1958. At the time it set the standard for hotels. Boyd Gaming says the site will set the standard again when the new project called Echelon Place opens. The Stardust sits on 63 acres on Las Vegas Boulevard -- the most coveted address in Nevada. In March of 2007 the square will be cleared and construction on Echelon Place will start. There will be four hotels in all with a total of 5,300 rooms.
Bob Boughner, with Boyd Gaming, said, "What we decided was that a collection of more intimate hotels would be greater than one big super-sized hotel." Boughner will run the project. For the past seven years he's been in charge of the Boyd Gaming/MGM Mirage joint venture in Atlantic City called Borgata.
Boughner says the largest of the four hotels will be the Echelon resort. It will be accompanied by the Shangri-La, the Delano, and Mondrian. Boyd Gaming has high expectations as they plan to attack the market share of the biggest casinos. Bob Boughner said, "Echelon Place will compete effectively with the likes of Wynn, Bellagio, and the Venetian."
There will be shopping, two theaters, a massive convention area and 140,000 square feet of casino space. It will also be the catalyst of the next phase of building on the north end of Las Vegas Boulevard.
Bob Boughner said, "It will give tremendous life to the northern part of the Strip, which has been ripe for development for a number of years."
Still, after almost 48 years of the Stardust standing in that spot some tourists are sad about the change. Many others, like Las Vegas visitor Tony Daluga, don't mind making way for the new. "The building, it cannot hurt to upgrade you know. Make it a little nicer. Fit into the year 2000 you know," Daluga commented.
The Stardust will close in 2007. All of the employees will be spread over the other 19 properties owned by Boyd Gaming. Echelon Place will open in 2010.
The price tag on Echelon Place is $4 billion. The development will be the second largest on the Las Vegas Strip -- second only to MGM-Mirage's City Center. That $6 billion project will be constructed between the Monte Carlo and Bellagio.
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*All that damn money to build another major hotel but not enough cash in case of another terrorist attack*
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