On WHYY this morning, Elizabeth Fiedler's piece about the multi-day conference that is convening to discuss the casinos and their place in the riverfront plan included a great quote from Sugarhouse spokeswoman, Leigh Whitaker:
"We're not going to participate in a process designed to get us to move," said Whitaker, "by all accounts of what I've read publicly this is about finding all the reasons why these locations are bad. It just didn't seems reasonable for us to participate in that process."
In other words, Sugarhouse (and I'm assuming Foxwoods) are hesitant to go to a meeting which features a bunch of people telling them how much they suck. They apparently feel like John McCain at a college Dems rally.
What they might be missing, however, is just how much they could help themselves by attending, listening and enacting EVERY change recommended by the group. That includes changes to the design, the location of the parking, access to transit, even hours of operation. If this group says the casinos should look like a couple blocks of low-rise, ground level retail, with walk up apartments and parking lots near the airport with shuttle or rail service, they should do it not matter what the cost.
I don't know much about gambling as a business but if Ocean's 11 has taught me anything, it's that running one of these things is basically like a license to print money. Whatever the cost of making the casinos palatable in a design sense to the mayor, the neighbors and the riverfront stakeholders, the casino owners will eventually make it back.
Why?
Because the gamblers don't care what they look like. Put a few hundred slot machines in an abandoned subway stop and they'd be in use nearly 24 hours a day.
In the meantime, as the casinos push back and resist on any attempts to change or even re-site, they lose money in the foregone revenue. This solution doesn't satisfy those who don't want any legalized gambling at all in the city, a group which counts me among its number. Largest city with legalized gambling is not really a distinction we should be striving for. How about largest city with an all green zoning and building code? Or largest city with an infrastructure for plug-in hybrids?
So no, this doesn't keep casinos out totally, but at least it keeps the casinos from getting in the way of the community-generated vision for the waterfront.
Comments (3)
The way this city runs in 20 yrs casino or not the waterfront will still look like crap
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