In a dramatic farewell to one of Las Vegas’s storied landmarks, The Tropicana is set to be reduced to rubble in a spectacle of dust and memories. The fate of the iconic hotel and casino, which has graced the famous Strip since the spring of 1957, has been sealed. The final act will be orchestrated by Controlled Demolition, Inc.—a name whispered with reverence in the business of engineered collapses. This is the same team that masterminded the fall of the Landmark in 1995 and the Riviera in 2015.
Yet the Tropicana’s swan song will not be immediate; a meticulous march towards its final bow involves obtaining dust control and asbestos abatement permits, and meticulous preparations for crowd and traffic management must be completed. A special events permit is also on the checklist for Bally’s Corp., the current magnates of the Tropicana empire.
According to a revelation in the Las Vegas Review-Journal, October skies will witness The Trop’s descent. This forecast comes tinged with a hint of uncertainty, as Soo Kim, Bally’s Corp.’s chair, suggests that this timeline hinges on the complex web of permitting and unforeseen alterations. There’s an air of mystery shrouding whether the Tropicana will meet its end beneath the calculated elegance of an implosion or succumb to the brute force of a wrecking ball. Regardless of the method, a prologue of preparation will precede and a chapter of cleanup will follow.
Despite its impending destruction, the Tropicana still glimmers with life, offering rooms up until its final night on April 1. The going rates for a weekend stay are steeped in nostalgia, and the clang of slot machines and rustle of card games will persist until they echo for the last time in the early hours of April 3.
As Bally’s sets its sights on crafting a new tale with a $1.5 billion baseball stadium for the Oakland Athletics and an adjacent casino hotel, their story is marred by fiscal shadows. A spiraling credit rating thrust into ‘junk’ territory by Moody’s and the specter of an $800 million shortfall for a Chicago venture loom over their aspirations. In the chess game of high finance, Bally’s subsequent moves will be costly, given the steep interest rates required to woo investors amidst their high-risk profile.
The current guardian of the Tropicana’s legacy is Gaming and Leisure Properties Inc., which entered into a half-century lease with Bally’s in 2021. This land, ripe with history and potential, spans 35 acres—a canvas for imagined futures that skeptics fear may devolve into yet another expanse of vacant desolation on the neon-lit corridor of Las Vegas.
For a city accustomed to the ceremonious cycle of demolition and rebirth, the loss of the Tropicana is steeped in sentiment. There’s a collective apprehension that the Strip’s vibrant tapestry of history might fray, yielding to empty plots that yawn in the desert sun, hungry for dreams to be realized in brick, mortar, and the thrill of chance.
