CityCenter Facts & Figures
- Cost: Approximately $11 billion
- Opening: 2009
- 7,000+ hotel and condo units
- 100,000 square-foot casino
From the Vegas4Visitors Weekly Update of May 4, 2009
After months of negotiation, tribulation, accusations, litigation, and general acrimony, it appears that CityCenter will be completed after all.
The $8 billion plus complex of hotels, condos, casino, shopping, and entertainment facilities was in danger of sinking into bankruptcy after a rift between partners MGM Mirage and Dubai World. The short version is that MGM Mirage is having financial difficulties and Dubai World grew concerned about their massive investment, causing them to halt their contributions toward debt payments. The project was short more than a billion dollars needed to complete it.
Now the two partners have kissed and made up and financing has been secured, virtually guaranteeing that the complex will open as scheduled.
A condominium tower called Vdara will open first in October with the main hotel and casino, Aria, opening in December. The rest of the property will open in stages after that.
From the Vegas4Visitors Weekly Update of June 9, 2008
As the massive skyscrapers under construction at CityCenter start to tower over The Strip, new details are emerging about some of the features of the project, including a name for the main hotel.
Aria is the moniker bestowed upon CityCenter’s centerpiece. It will feature more than 4,000 rooms, a big casino, restaurants, an Elvis themed Cirque du Soleil show, a spa and fitness center, bars, nightclubs, and more.
The Crystals will aim to satisfy the shopping needs of visitors, with more than 500,000 square-feet of retail located just adjacent to Aria.
These new names join the previously announced Vdara condominium hotel, Veer condos, the Mandarin Oriental hotel, and the Harmon hotel and residences.
The 60-plus acres just south of Bellagio will be enhanced with a $40 million public art project including a massive sculpture from celebrated artist Maya Lin.
The price tag for all of this keeps going up, with some estimates as high as $11 billion. It is the most expensive privately funded construction project in history.
CityCenter will open in phases beginning in late 2009.
From the Vegas4Visitors Weekly Update of April 2, 2007:
CityCenter Update
The largest privately financed construction project in United States history is well underway on more than 60 acres between Monte Carlo and Bellagio. The project from MGM Mirage resorts will feature more than 7,000 hotel and condominium units in several different towers (including a 4,000 room main hotel and several boutique hotels and condos), a casino, a giant shopping mall, entertainment venues, restaurants, parks and open spaces, and its own shuttle system to move people around the enormous facility. The main tower is rising steadily out of the earth and the rest of the land is crawling with activity heading toward a 2009 opening date. Total cost: more than $7 billion.
The photo at the right, taken by V4V staff on April 5th, shows the progress since the following photos.
Construction Photos - October 2006
Taken from the rear of the property, behind Monte Carlo. In the background is Bellagio. The low structure under construction is the main 4,000 room hotel/casino.
From the NYNY parking garage. The building to the right is Monte Carlo. The buildings to the left are unrelated condominium towers on the other side of the freeway. The first couple of floors of the main Project CityCenter hotel tower are visible just to the left of the Monte Carlo building.
See above.
From the Vegas4Visitors Weekly Update of November 27, 2006:
CityCenter Preview
I got an e-mail recently from our friends at MGM Mirage, which gave us some details about their upcoming CityCenter project, the massive $7 billion complex of casinos, hotels, condos, and entertainment that is currently being built between Bellagio and Monte Carlo. In addition to the artist rendering seen above, these are some of the other tidbits they let out of the bag:
- CityCenter’s iconic feature will be a dramatic soaring hotel tower, casino, and convention center. Designed by Pelli Clarke Pelli, the 60-story, 4,000-room hotel/casino will act as the hub for a retail and entertainment district featuring high-end retailers, clubs, gourmet restaurants, galleries, and more.
- CityCenter’s gaming resort will offer the first-ever natural light casino.
- The Veer Towers, designed by architect Helmut Jahn, will rise from CityCenter’s retail and entertainment district and will appear as two glass towers leaning in opposite directions. Each of the 37-story towers will each house more than 350 condominium residences ranging from 500 to 2,600 square feet and available in studio, one-and-two-bedroom flats and penthouses.
- Vdara Condo Hotel will be the complex’s sole condo hotel, a 50-story ebony tower that will feature approximately 1,543 residential units including studios, deluxe studios, one-bedroom suites and one- and two-bedroom multi-level penthouse suites, ranging from 500 to 1,850 square feet.
- The Residences at Mandarin Oriental will feature approximately 227 condominium residences situated on the upper floors of the 400-room hotel tower, with a private owner’s lobby and clubroom. Residences will be available in one-and-two-bedroom plans, or two-and-three-bedroom penthouses ranging from 1,000 to 4,100 square feet.
- The Harmon Hotel & Residences will have a pool deck perched 100 feet above the Strip to accompany the 400 hotel rooms and approximately 228 condominium residences from 800 to 4,200 square feet available as one-and-two-bedroom flats and penthouses.
- A sales office for the new residences is expected to open in early 2007 and there’s already a preview center open at Bellagio. You can also find information (primarily about the condos) on the official website at www.citycenter.com. Finally, if you’re serious about wanting to buy one of the residences, you can call 702-590-5999 or 866-708-7111.
From the Vegas4Visitors Weekly Update of October 30, 2006:
CityCenter Condos Unveiled
Want to live in the heart of the largest privately financed development in US history? Got $8 million? That’s what it’s going to cost you if you want one of the super-luxe penthouses at CityCenter, the $7 billion development of hotels, casinos, entertainment, and residential units currently under construction on The Strip between Monte Carlo and Bellagio. The project will have five condo towers – Vdara, a 1,500 unit complex; the twin Veer Towers, both 37-story high-rises; and condos atop the Mandarin Oriental and Harmon boutique hotels. If you’re interested, stop by the Bellagio where you can get a sneak peek in the preview center at the units, which will start at around $500,000 and go up from there.
From the Vegas4Visitors Weekly Update of August 21, 2006:
Blue Suede Acrobat Shoes
It’s officially official: yet another Cirque show is being planned for the Las Vegas Strip and this one will feature music by none other than Elvis. CKX, Inc. (managers of official Elvis ventures) and Cirque du Soleil formally announced the show last week, saying it would open in November 2009 at the new Project CityCenter complex going up between Monte Carlo and Bellagio. No details were included with the announcement in terms of what the show would be like but one would expect them to use their experience creating “Love,” featuring music by The Beatles, as a blue-suede-print.
From the Vegas4Visitors Weekly Update of February 13, 2006:
Did I Say $6 Billion?
Remember that story I did just last week about how Project CityCenter, the
massive new development from MGM Mirage going in between Monte
Carlo and Bellagio, had gotten bigger and was going to now cost $6 billion, up from the original $4 billion they said it would cost? Yeah, scratch that. Apparently now it’s $7 billion. Why the bigger price tag? Well, part if it is the addition of more condo/hotel units (over 6,000 hotel and condos total), the addition of a property-wide monorail system, and a general desire to make the place more luxurious then they had originally envisioned. This, combined with rising construction costs in the area, have resulted in the shocking new total. Construction will begin in earnest this summer and they have set an opening date for phase one in November of 2009.
From the Vegas4Visitors Weekly Update of February 6, 2006:
Project CityCenter Gets Bigger
It was already the biggest construction project ever planned for The Strip and one of the biggest ever in the United States but now Project CityCenter, the new city-within-a-city planned by MGM Mirage, is getting even bigger. The company announced last week that they were adding over 1,000 more condominium/hotel and traditional condo units, bringing the total number to 2,800. Combine that with the 4,000 hotel rooms slated for the project and you can see why the bill for the whole thing has now gone up from $4 billion when originally announced to a heart-stopping $6 billion now. Construction is scheduled to begin in April of this year and the facility, which will include a casino, entertainment venues, shopping, and more, is scheduled to open in phases throughout 2009 and 2010.
From the Vegas4Visitors Weekly Update of September 19, 2005:
Project CityCenter Price Tag: $5 Billion
It is being called the largest privately financed real estate development in the United States and with a price tag now reported to be in the $5 billion range I’m willing to believe them.
The development in question is Project CityCenter, a massive project slated to cover more than 60 acres of land between the Monte Carlo and Bellagio. Recently the people in charge of the development, MGM Mirage, released a few more details about what you can expect to see in a few years on a Strip near you.
Project CityCenter is designed to be an environmentally sustainable city-within-a-city, complete with its own power plant, water systems, and other ecologically sensitive considerations.
The centerpiece of the development will be a 60-story, 4,000-room hotel and casino designed by award-winning architect Cesar Pelli, the man responsible for the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur, currently the tallest buildings in the world. This seems to signal that the folks at MGM Mirage are intent on making Project CityCenter more than just another casino with a bunch of hotel towers stuck on top of it. Instead, Pelli and other important architects have been tasked with coming up with something dramatic and architecturally evocative to enhance the skyline of Vegas.
There will be two 400-room boutique hotels on the property as well. One will be run by the Mandarin Oriental Hotel Group, a luxury hotel chain that operates nearly two dozen swank properties around the world.
There will also be a half-million square-feet of retail, restaurant, and entertainment venues and more than 1,600 condominiums, some in high-rise towers and others done as brownstone or loft style units to enhance that city-within-a-city feel.
To fit all of the people expected to play, live, and work in the development, more than 18,000 parking spaces are being incorporated into the design but will be hidden (presumably behind things or under things) so as not to mess up the architectural integrity with a boring parking garage.
A west-side of The Strip monorail is also in the works that will eventually hook up all of the MGM Mirage properties on that side of the street from Mandalay Bay at the south end past Luxor, Excalibur, New York-New York, and Monte Carlo to Project CityCenter then continuing north to Bellagio, Mirage, and Treasure Island (bypassing Caesars Palace somehow which is the only major property on the west side of The Strip not owned by the company).
The Boardwalk Hotel will close within the next year (although no date has been set) so construction can begin by late 2006. According to the plans the first phases of the Project City Center should be up and running by late 2009 or 2010.
From the Vegas4Visitors Weekly Update of April 18, 2005:
Renown Architect To Design New Strip Hotel
Cesar Pelli has been hired to design the new 4,000 room hotel for the upcoming Project CityCenter complex from MGM Mirage. I know... who is Cesar Pelli and why should you care?
Pelli is one of the foremost architects, most widely known for his designs of the Petronas towers in Malaysia, the tallest buildings in the world.
The new Vegas hotel he's designing will also have two towers that will also stand out for their height, although only in relation to the surrounding buildings. The buildings will each be 60-stories in height, almost double the 30 or so stories of hotels like Bellagio, Paris, and Monte Carlo that are nearby.
Project CityCenter is the code name for the $4.4 billion development slated to replace the Boardwalk Hotel and other land between Bellagio and Monte Carlo. In addition to the 4,000 room main hotel and its casino, showrooms, and restaurants, there will also be three 1,500 room "boutique" hotels (one rumored to be a Ritz-Carlton), condos, shopping, and entertainment facilities.
Demolition of the Boardwalk will probably happen before the end of the year with serious construction starting in 2006. The whole thing will open in phases starting in 2009.
From the Vegas4Visitors Weekly Update of November 15, 2004:
MGM Mirage Plans $4 Billion Mega-Project
Steve Wynn is spending $2.5 billion on Wynn Las Vegas. Shrug. MGM Mirage can top that. How does $4 billion sound?
The mega company has announced plans to build a mega-project between Bellagio and Monte Carlo that will not only change the face of Las Vegas but could be a blueprint for future development on and around The Strip.
Project CityCenter, as it is now being called, will eventually be a massive 66-acre development with a first phase calling for 18-million square-feet of hotel, casino, entertainment, retail, and residential space. To put that into context, the Venetian claims to be the largest hotel in the world in terms of square-footage and it has about a third of what’s going into Project CityCenter. And that’s just the first phase!
The development will be designed as an urban metropolis – a city-within-a-city – expected to employ over 12,000 people with room for thousands more guests, visitors, and residents.
The first phase will include not one but four hotels. The main resort will be a 4,000-room casino-hotel with all of the restaurants, showrooms, retail, and entertainment space usually associated with something that massive. In addition, three 400-room “boutique” hotels will be built on the land to be operated by what the company calls “internationally recognized companies not currently operating in Las Vegas.”
In addition to all of the dining and entertainment options included within the four hotels boundaries there will be an additional 550,000-square-foot complex devoted to even more food, shopping, and fun.
The final component will be 1,650 luxury condominiums and although exact size and costs of the units have not been determined, you can expect they ain’t going to be cheap. In fact the company plans to finance a big chunk of the overall project through the sales of residential units so I’d be surprised if you see anything in there for less than half a million dollars.
The company has approved a “master plan” for the land but will be spending the next 18 months or so developing full, final architectural plans. Construction could begin as soon as spring of 2006 with completion of the first phase in 2010.
What does this mean for the company’s Boardwalk Hotel & Casino, now soldiering on as one of the last remaining low-cost alternatives on The Strip? Buh-bye. The hotel will remain open during the planning phase but it’ll probably be a pile of rubble by the summer of 2006.
What’s not clear in the company’s plans are what all of this means for the other properties they don’t own between Bellagio and Monte Carlo.
Before we go any further, let’s talk about definitions here. MGM Mirage, which owns the Boardwalk and Bellagio among others, is in the process of buying Mandalay Resorts, which owns Monte Carlo among others. That means when the deal is done, Monte Carlo and Bellagio will be sister hotels under the same corporate umbrella.
The land between them includes the Boardwalk, which is right next door to Monte Carlo, Harmon Avenue, and land not controlled by either company. This is where you’ll find the Seven nightclub, the Jockey Club time-shares, and what was recently announced as the future home to several thousand new condos from a separate developer.
Whether the master plan incorporates these is not clear but if you look closely at the artists’ concept of what the new development may look like you may notice that none of the non-MGM Mirage-Mandalay properties are there. To be sure, this is in no way a final rendering, but it leads me to speculate they want every square inch of the land between the Monte Carlo and Bellagio and are obviously willing to spend big bucks to make their dream a reality.
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