Detroit with a Boardwalk
October 22, 2014 4:02 PM   Subscribe

"Wonder why Atlantic City is failing? The better question, the one asked by people who know the town: Why did anyone think it would ever succeed?"
posted by ActionPopulated (30 comments total) 16 users marked this as a favorite
 
Good article. The other thing that Vegas has that Atlantic City never will is a dry, sunny, warm climate all year long, especially when much of the country is covered with snow or rainclouds. Who the hell wants to be in Atlantic City in late January?
posted by GuyZero at 4:13 PM on October 22, 2014 [4 favorites]


Why Atlantic City is dying.
Everything dies, baby. That's a fact.
posted by Flunkie at 4:18 PM on October 22, 2014 [45 favorites]


I don't know why people keep thinking that casinos are engines of urban salvation; they're such hermetically sealed entities that they have almost no interaction with their surrounding areas. The state put one four blocks from my house about five years ago and it just exists in it's own little bubble, it's not like anyone from the casino wanders out into our little shopping district or eats at the local pizza place. People just drive directly in from the highway exit into the parking garage; spend all their money and then drive back to the suburbs.
posted by octothorpe at 4:39 PM on October 22, 2014 [32 favorites]


de jure monopoly declines when the winds shift and competition is legalized, film at 11.
posted by chimaera at 4:43 PM on October 22, 2014 [2 favorites]


The hermetically sealed aspect is one of the biggest killers of AC. There was a requirement that all the casinos have a hotel attached, and the result is people can stay in a little bubble, and street life never develops.
Las Vegas had no such rule, so it feels a lot more vibrant, as people move place to place. And yes, the weather helps, too.
posted by bashos_frog at 4:44 PM on October 22, 2014 [4 favorites]


I have no idea why anyone thinks building a casino will bring economic development. Nobody opens a gift shop, or a restaurant or whathaveyou near a casino, because the entire point of a casino is to keep people inside and separate them from their money.

Sure, Vegas. But Vegas is a destination in and of itself. Gambling in Vegas is Gambling in Vegas. Gambling in AC ? Might as well go to Ho-Chunk in Oconomowoc.

Also, the wisdom of a taxpayer supported Casino opening in 2008 ? How the Democrats have failed to tie that albatross to Christie, I will never understand.
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 4:44 PM on October 22, 2014 [6 favorites]


Yuck, I forgot to never ever read the comments on Politico.
posted by octothorpe at 4:52 PM on October 22, 2014 [1 favorite]


Atlantic City is the saddest place I haver been. Excepting maybe the Jai-Alai and dog tracks in Florida. Same desperate, sad, lonely vibe.
posted by umberto at 4:53 PM on October 22, 2014 [5 favorites]


Vegas has a street life? I remember walking about 45 minutes to get from one hotel to the one next door. Ok, I was on the strip.

Atlantic City is certainly a different kind of sad, with the moving walkways that take you deep into the bowels of a hotel so you can never find your way back to the boardwalk.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 5:07 PM on October 22, 2014


Vegas has a street life? I remember walking about 45 minutes to get from one hotel to the one next door. Ok, I was on the strip.

I've only been to Vegas once, but when I was there the sidewalks on the strip were packed with pedestrians. Once you got a few blocks off the strip the streets emptied out, but the strip itself was bustling.
posted by Dip Flash at 5:35 PM on October 22, 2014 [2 favorites]


Having been to AC once only for a trade show, I wouldn't go back for any reason if I lived ten miles away. And that was when it was "nice." The feedback loop or death spiral is under way and it can't be reversed because, as the article points out, there is no there there.

The comments thread is poison.
posted by Repack Rider at 6:06 PM on October 22, 2014 [1 favorite]


Also, the wisdom of a taxpayer supported Casino opening in 2008 ? How the Democrats have failed to tie that albatross to Christie, I will never understand.

NJ Dems stink just as bad as NJ Repubs; scum from both parties got their beaks wet on that deal.
posted by Renoroc at 7:08 PM on October 22, 2014 [1 favorite]


Nucky Thompson could've put this place back on top.
posted by Spatch at 7:16 PM on October 22, 2014 [3 favorites]


Given the rotten way this whole enterprise was set up in the '70s, this development is hardly a surprise. The book "Boardwalk Jungle" is required reading.

Background: Both my parents, who were not exactly liberals, voted against the Atlantic City casino referendum in 1976.
posted by computech_apolloniajames at 7:32 PM on October 22, 2014 [1 favorite]


I spent a year and a half of my life commuting to AC from Philadelphia to grind out a living at the poker tables. I have complicated feelings about the town and can't say whether or not I would be sad to see it vanish.
posted by 256 at 8:28 PM on October 22, 2014 [2 favorites]


I've only been to Vegas once, but when I was there the sidewalks on the strip were packed with pedestrians. Once you got a few blocks off the strip the streets emptied out, but the strip itself was bustling.

That was my experience too. It didn't matter what time of the day or night it was, the strip was always packed with people. Vegas really is a 24-hour city.

The hermetically sealed aspect is one of the biggest killers of AC. There was a requirement that all the casinos have a hotel attached, and the result is people can stay in a little bubble, and street life never develops.
Las Vegas had no such rule, so it feels a lot more vibrant, as people move place to place.


Almost all the casinos on the Vegas Strip are in hotels. I think one of the keys is something touched on in the article: in Las Vegas, they aren't just casinos with hotels attached. They all have other attractions - the article mentions Siegfried & Roy's Secret Garden at the Mirage and the Shark Reef at Mandalay Bay, but each of them has something unique and interesting: rides, theming, shows, gigantic shopping arenas, restaurants, you name it. There's plenty to keep your attention even if you don't gamble.
posted by SisterHavana at 9:10 PM on October 22, 2014 [3 favorites]


I work in an industry where every company involved, holds their National Championships in Atlantic City (well, at least the ones on the east coast.). Every time I go there, I'm utterly amazed that thousands of young kids descend into that Hive of Scum And Villainy each summer. A lot of you guys have talked about how much of a bubble those casinos create, and the ironic part is that the very bubble that helped to create that unsafe-ness, is the thing that lets the kids stay safe.

The Boardwalk is guarded with religious fervor, as are the casinos, just because they're casinos. But almost as soon as you step out of the NorthWest Entrance to any of these places still open, it's a different town.

Yet, I'm always amazed how many of those
DO
AC
Stickers I see everywhere. Not as many WOW stickers, but pretty close.
posted by WeX Majors at 10:23 PM on October 22, 2014


There's plenty to keep your attention even if you don't gamble.

Indeed, I enjoy going to Vegas, and I rarely spend more than $5 gambling each time (a few minutes at a poker machine or something before I get bored with it). There's lots of other stuff to do, and I invariably spend a lot of time walking around outside.
posted by primethyme at 11:11 PM on October 22, 2014 [1 favorite]


Why did anyone think it would ever succeed?"

Well, location, location, location, surely. But two key things changed the game; the first was airline deregulation, which led to dirt-cheap airfares to Vegas, and the second, naturally, was the advent of Native American rights to run casinos, and to a lesser extent, the expansion of gambling nationally such as the riverboat casinos of the Midwest and the spread of state lotteries and Powerball.

Basically, what may have made sense in 1978, when Vegas practically had a monopoly on US legal gaming money, made less and less sense in large part due to Atlantic City breaking that (apparent, de facto) monopoly, and in a sense opening the floodgates to the normalization of gambling. They just didn't see that they wouldn't be able to own this new space they had created.

I also think it's clear that the way the casinos were allowed to develop in AC was not healthy and was doomed to fail to both spread the benefits around and be sustainable or encourage synergistic development that would be. Vegas did figure this out, and in such inhospitable territory, and has managed to remain Vegas even as gambling becomes less and less a part of the Vegas experience. So, yeah, things like the hermetically sealed casino district were in retrospect an enormous mistake.
posted by dhartung at 11:48 PM on October 22, 2014 [2 favorites]


Atlantic City is the saddest place I haver been.

You must visit Reno, then, especially if you like gaming ruins! Reno was always the ugliest sister in the Nevada gambling trifecta of Reno, Tahoe and Vegas: none of the spectacle of Vegas, none of the splendor of Tahoe, just raw gaming. The Greyhound terminal here in Sacramento had a special door for the gambler's special which I swear had shamrocks and pots of gold.

That town is trying its heart out too and its not an entirely bad little town but the glitter is gone and there's nothing to replace it.
posted by Ogre Lawless at 12:46 AM on October 23, 2014 [3 favorites]


I have little to add about Atlantic City but I saw the title to this thread and I seriously got pretty excited by the idea of building a boardwalk in Detroit.

That would be pretty awesome.
posted by adoarns at 3:58 AM on October 23, 2014 [2 favorites]


My great-grandparents made an annual trek from Pittsburgh to Atlantic City, where they spent a whole month basically walking the Boardwalk. These were not wealthy people, and they did not stay near the ocean. Mostly they played in the surf and mingled with friends from home who were also vacationing there.

The tradition continued until the 60s, when my folks enjoyed the off-season rates in palaces like the Marlborough Blenheim, where an ancient quartet played in the lobby and meals were served on white tablecloths, and people lined "Peacock Alley" to chat and watch each other.

In 1978 we had a final family reunion in the Marlborough just before it was torn down. Due to a strange mixup in our reservations, we ended up in the penthouse, with an insane outdoor private balcony. The whole family sat on that balcony to watch the Park Place fireworks next door.

Since we knew the place would be torn down shortly, I took some time late one night to photograph the interiors, together with my great aunt, who had grown up visiting the city. As I set up my tripod, she kept up a running commentary of the past:

"This is where the afternoon tea dances were held. Everyone dressed in white, men and women alike. You would not dream of going onto the Boarwalk unless appropriately dressed for the time of day. There was a stained glass roof, and the colors on the dancers were beautiful on a sunny afternoon. One day a skydiver landed on the roof and broke it...."

By the time i'd shot the whole place, we were surrounded by ghosts: elegant women of fashion, gentlemen in evening dress... Our Gang and Laurel and Hardy on the Steel Pier, the diving bell, rides on the Steeplechase...

I didn't see AC again until 30 years later, when we simply drove through. The only thing worth visiting there now is Lucy, the Margate Elephant.
posted by kinnakeet at 4:32 AM on October 23, 2014 [20 favorites]


I don't know why people keep thinking that casinos are engines of urban salvation; they're such hermetically sealed entities that they have almost no interaction with their surrounding areas. The state put one four blocks from my house about five years ago and it just exists in it's own little bubble, it's not like anyone from the casino wanders out into our little shopping district or eats at the local pizza place. People just drive directly in from the highway exit into the parking garage; spend all their money and then drive back to the suburbs.

Where I live--Kingston, ON--there is some talk about building a casino right in our downtown waterfront area. There is a considerable amount of pushback, with admittedly a strong hint of NIMBYism. My personal feelings are that it won't do as much as supporters think it will for our local economy, and honestly Kingston doesn't have the sort of hotels that could handle the spillover. Downtown is where the closest thing we have to expensive hotels are (and a pity for a tourist on a budget; there are no moderately priced/cheap lodgings in our lovely downtown core) but I can't see where casino adherents would stay. In any case, there is already a casino in operation about 30 minutes or so away in Gananoque, and from what I hear, the citizens of that town haven't seen squat in terms of local revenue from that casino.
posted by Kitteh at 4:59 AM on October 23, 2014


Not helping Atlantic City is the saturation of the gambling market in the areas surrounding it. Between AC, Indian casinos and the various "racinos" at racetracks there are just so many places a gambler can go if all they're looking to do it gamble for a few hours. Even here in Western NY, we have multiple choices within an hour's drive or so (and that's not including Ontario). Some of my family who live on Long Island go to AC, but it's always day trips (my mom takes the senior's bus), they never stay overnight. And really, why would they?
posted by tommasz at 5:58 AM on October 23, 2014


Oh man. You gotta read all the way to end so you don't miss the last two paragraphs. Some state legislators want to fix Atlantic City by... opening up casinos in the rest of New Jersey and using the tax revenue from those guys to prop up AC.
posted by mhum at 10:32 AM on October 23, 2014


Thanks for that bit of history, kinnekeet. My impression was that AC had always been tacky. It sounds like there was a certain gentility that couldn't last, if all the money AC had coming in came from just summer visitors. I wonder if, at this point, they can't just close up shop and help everyone leave. Who really goes there anymore? What other industry could save it?

NYC has a casino now, near the end of the line on the A train in Queens. And if one wants, they can take the 4 train up to Bedford Park Boulevard and from there a 10-minute bus ride outside that station to a casino at Yonkers Raceway. No New Yorker need even go up to Foxwoods in CT, even, much less drive down to AC. I understand Foxwood brings in good nationally-known acts, though, so it's more than greasy food, cheap drinks and slots. I went to that Queens one once, with a group of friends to celebrate one of their birthdays, and never again. I was completely overwhelmed. And the awful Beatles "tribute" band did not make up for my spending $20 and losing $8. That, a visit to a "hotel" in Queensland that was lousy with "fruit machines", and a laughable game of Blackjack on a cruise ship 10 years ago is the extent of my high-rolling.

(OMG, pogo_fuzzybutt, I remember seeing highway billboards for Ho-Chunk as a kid, though I never went as an adult. Still a going concern, then!)
posted by droplet at 11:23 AM on October 23, 2014


I got a special cheap day-trip bus ride to Atlantic City and cleverly thought I would escape the casinos and have a day walking around the city and taking pictures. I did, but it was pictures of closed shops and pawn shops with broken windows.
posted by acrasis at 5:54 PM on October 23, 2014


Since we knew the place would be torn down shortly, I took some time late one night to photograph the interiors, together with my great aunt, who had grown up visiting the city.

Whoah! Please let me know if you ever decide to post those -- especially if you include commentary. Would love to get a taste of that world.
posted by evil otto at 5:02 AM on October 24, 2014 [1 favorite]


Evil otto, for a taste of the buildings , especially the Marlborough, check out "The King of Marvin Gardens" which used extensive interior shots of the hotel just before it closed. The MB was the first reinforced concrete structure in the world and was designed by Thomas Edison.
posted by kinnakeet at 7:06 AM on October 24, 2014 [2 favorites]


> Where I live--Kingston, ON--there is some talk about building a casino right in our downtown waterfront area. There is a considerable amount of pushback, with admittedly a strong hint of NIMBYism. My personal feelings are that it won't do as much as supporters think it will for our local economy, and honestly Kingston doesn't have the sort of hotels that could handle the spillover...

FWIW, Pittsburgh's casino doesn't have a hotel, and, with the exception of a couple tiny B&Bs, there's pretty much nowhere to stay within anything approaching walking distance. What it does have, however, is an enormous parking garage that just about has its own freeway exit. As octothorpe indicated, it's half a mile from Downtown, but it might as well be out in the middle of nowhere.

I haven't seen any sort of user surveys, but I'd be surprised if anyone was coming from out of the area to go to the casino. It strikes me as much more likely that it's just sucking up money from our neighbourhoods that used to go to scratchoffs and beer, or perhaps the horse track in the next county.
posted by FlyingMonkey at 4:06 PM on November 7, 2014


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