NV: Governor (Gibbons) praises meeting with Obama (will work w/aRnie to build Mag-Lev from LV to LA)

AP on Yahoo ^ | 12/2/08 | AP

[dr_who]

A-men. If San Francisco was to spontaneously fall into the sea and take a few neighboring areas with it, I’d cheer. Should we sacrifice LA in the event of a nuclear standoff with China? Hmmmmmmmm......

[NormsRevenge]

I hear ya, I haven’t driven it much when we visit since all the latest new hotels were built. .. and you’re not strange, it’s fun just popping in and out of shops and the joints along the strip. :-)

[Bookie1066]

The strip monorail in Vegas doesn't work cause IT DOESN”T GO ANYWHERE! It runs from the MGM north to the Convention Center. The only people who use it are people who have or are going to shows at the Convention Center. It needs to be extended to the airport and to downtown. The problem is the mob controlled cab companies are fighting it cause they'll lose fares and the strip casino owners will not allow anything to be built that will help downtown and cut into their business.

20 years ago a German company was ready to build a maglev from LA to Vegas. I worked on it drilling holes every 500 feet down the middle of I-15 for geotech studies. The company's plan was to use these trains around the world with stops in downtowns to revitalize city centers. The Vegas stop would have been downtown. The strip casino owners said no way. All travel most come to the strip. The German company even tried to compromise and have a stop at the airport first then downtown. Not even that was ok with the casino owners who did not want anything going to the downtown casinos. The company walked away and we're still waiting for this pie in the sky train.

So now 20 years later the airlines are cutting flights, nobody can afford to drive here and 60% of their $500 a night rooms are sitting empty. Short sighted idiot casino owners.

[bpjam]

It’s hard for casinos to predict this kind of global meltdown. They made the money while it was there to be made and now they will have to remake The Strip again just like they’ve done repeatedly since Bugsy.

The Monorail needs to go to the airport or its pointless but it also needs to go to the other side of the Strip. But it’s essentially a giant toy for the LVCVA since it is designed primarily to get people to the Convention Center and not to one of the convention centers at any of the hotels like Venetian, Mandalay Bay or Bellagio.

Who was going to pay for that German maglev train? I haven’t been here for 20 years yet so I don’t have the history on that one.