Construction often moves very slowly on the Las Vegas Strip. That's partly due to scale and at least partly due to Las Vegas being located in a fairly remote desert where it's not easy to bring in the needed materials.
Not every project takes 20 years like Fontainebleau Las Vegas, but an awful lot of projects get announced, and maybe even have a ribbon cutting without ever actually getting built. There are multiple potential NBA arena projects on the Strip that have reached the announcement phase, for example, where no actual steps have been taken to start construction.
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There are other projects like Dream Las Vegas, a boutique resort casino near Harry Reid International Airport, which ran out of money mid-construction. That incomplete hotel and casino could get back on track with its original owners, find new backers, or become a sad, decaying sculpture blighting the Strip.
Some Las Vegas Strip projects do, however, move faster than expected. That appears to be the case for the new Major League Baseball stadium expected to be built for the Oakland Athletics on the site of Bally's Corp.'s (BALY) -) Tropicana.
The A's have not actually received permission to move to Las Vegas, but that has not slowed down work on the project. Comments from Gaming and Leisure Properties Inc. (GLPI) -) CEO Peter Carlino during the company's second-quarter earnings call made it clear that the Tropicana, the second-oldest casino on the Strip behind Caesars Entertainment's (CZR) -) Flamingo, are numbered.
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A's Aren't Waiting for MLB Permission
Casino operators generally try to share as few details as possible as to when a property will shut down or when there will be construction on site. That's especially true when timelines are unclear because of factors -- in this case formal approval from MLB -- outside of the control of the company operating the casino.
In this case, Bally's does not want people to stop booking rooms at Bally's because it might not actually be open by the time their trip happens. With a Formula 1 race on the Strip in November and the Super Bowl in February, the company will likely sell out for those events even if work has begun simply because rooms are in such high demand.
Carlino's comments, however, did make it clear that the A's were not simply waiting for the league to make its decision.
"We've sat in on the all-hands construction meetings. And I can tell you, they're whipping this process pretty thoroughly. And meetings are scheduled well in advance. The entire design and planning teams are engaged," he said.
The A's Actually Don't Have Much Time
Gaming and Leisure Property owns the land that Tropicana sits on which is part of a 35-acre parcel. The company has given the A's 9 acres to build the stadium which will involve demolishing (or imploding) the current resort casino.
GLPI'sCOO made it clear that while the A's won't move in for quite a while, time was actually very limited.
"I think from what we understand they want to begin the 2028 season in that park. And when you start working backwards from that they don't have a lot of room for error," he said.
That means the team needs to be ready to go as soon as the move is approved (as is widely expected.)
"So I think once they have their major league baseball approval and we're reasonably certain the project is a go then I think you'll start to see a timeline come out for demolition of the current site that will permit the physical construction of the stadium to begin," he shared. "So I don't think there's a set timeline on this yet. But I will say when you work backwards from the 2028 opening day, there's not a lot of margin for error for the As team to get this done."
