Many Las Vegas casinos are back in business after a three-month hiatus due to COVID-19. Larger than expected crowds returned to America’s gambling capital this past weekend to get their degen on. But reopening weekend had mixed results, as you can see from the photos below.
The table games area at Caesars Palace was relatively packed on Saturday night, at least as far as social distancing requirements would allow them to be. (Image: CardsChat News/ June 6, 2020)
Las Vegas closed down in March for the first time in history due to the global health pandemic. Not even 9/11 or the 2008 housing crash could shut the city down. But one of the top tourists destinations in the world is slowly but surely opening back up. On Thursday and Friday, 12 of the 22 mega resorts on the Strip reopened.
Las Vegas Strip Mega Resorts Currently Open
- North End: Sahara, The Strat (formerly Stratosphere), Treasure Island, Venetian, Wynn
- Center Strip: Bellagio, Caesars Palace, Cosmopolitan, Flamingo, Harrah’s
- South End: MGM Grand, New York New York
- Still Closed: Aria, Cromwell, Excalibur, Luxor, Mandalay Bay, Mirage, Paris, Park MGM, Planet Hollywood, Tropicana
Las Vegas casinos reopened one minute after midnight, on Thursday at 12:01 am. The first reports indicated that Fremont Street, a popular downtown entertainment district, was jam-packed with virtually no social distancing taking place.
For someone like myself who believes COVID-19 remains a threat, this drew my concern. So, I decided to find out by visiting the casinos and the Strip throughout the weekend to see if social distancing was no longer existent in the town I’ve called home for the past eight years, and to also get a read on the demand for gambling in Sin City during a global health pandemic. And, from what I experienced, demand is higher than I expected, but lower than you may have been led to believe.
Socially Distant Reopening
On Thursday, I saw some positive signs for the future of Las Vegas casinos and its poker rooms. But the Strip, which always attracts more tourists and locals, was slow. I made that observation after visiting some of the casinos on Twitter, to which dozens of Vegas enthusiasts told me to calm down.
The Las Vegas Strip is a ghost town today despite the casinos reopening today. This isn’t good.
— Jon Sofen (@writing4poker) June 4, 2020
My initial post may have been a bit a bit harsh. After all, it was the first day the casinos reopened, and many are still concerned with catching the coronavirus. And I’m sure the Black Lives Matter protests didn’t help much in the way of attracting tourism. But I still expected the Strip to be busier than it was on Reopening Day.
Casino floor at freshly reopened Sahara was a ghost town the next day. (Image: CardsChat News/June 4, 2020)
Action at New York New York’s casino floor supposedly picked up later in the day, but it was a ghost town during the afternoon. (Image: CardsChat News/June 4, 2020)
Slot area at New York New York was also mostly empty. (Image: CardsChat News/ June 4, 2020)
Poker rooms in Las Vegas were a different story on Reopening Day. South Point had more than a dozen games running throughout much of the day. (Image: CardsChat News/ June 4, 2020)
Another view of the successful reopening of the South Point poker room. (Image: CardsChat News/ June 4, 2020)
New Era Emerges
After a slow first day, many anticipated an influx of tourists coming into town from California to pack the casinos. And they were, in a sense, correct. The casinos on the Strip were quite busy, all things considered, on Friday and Saturday nights. But slow when compared to a normal weekend in the pre-coronavirus days.
The local casinos such as Green Valley Ranch and Red Rock, both off-Strip properties, appeared to be as busy, or close to it, as normal. That tells me that my fellow locals fear not catching the coronavirus. And they’re ready to get back to their normal lives.
Table games at Green Valley Ranch (Image: CardsChat News, June 5, 2020)
Numerous games running at the Venetian poker room, all playing five-handed due to Nevada’s gaming board restrictions. (Image: CardsChat News/ June 5, 2020)
View from outside the Venetian poker room, which had a successful reopening weekend. (Image: CardsChat News/ June 5, 2020)
A sad sight — world-famous Bellagio poker room remains closed until further notice. (Image: CardsChat News / June 5, 2020)
Much of the slot machine area at Bellagio, and all Las Vegas casinos, was light on traffic during reopening weekend. (Image: CardsChat News/ June 5, 2020)
Bellagio installed a few hand sanitizer stations inside the casino. (Image: CardsChat News/ June 5, 2020)
Fremont Street visitors were required to show ID to enter. Only patrons 21 and over were permitted to enter the downtown district. (Image: CardsChat News, June 6, 2020)
Sad sight for poker in Vegas. Binion’s, the original home of the WSOP, closed down its poker room, and it appears it will be permanent. (Image: CardsChat News/ June 6, 2020)
Golden Nugget became the 4th Las Vegas poker room to reopen on Saturday. Play was five-handed and 6-8 games ran throughout much of the first day. (Image: CardsChat News, June 6, 2020)
Golden Nugget pool was reasonably busy, albeit slower than a normal Saturday afternoon. But most patrons appeared to be social distancing. (Image: CardsChat News/ June 6, 2020)
Three-handed blackjack at Golden Nugget, and all the Las Vegas casinos, is a temporary COVID-19 requirement. Quite a few three-handed blackjack tables were full on Saturday afternoon. (Image: CardsChat News/ June 6, 2020)
Slot machines at Golden Nugget, like all Las Vegas casinos, had limited seating to force patrons to social distance while playing slots. (Image: CardsChat News/ June 6, 2020)
Saturday Night Madness?
Although nearly half of the Las Vegas casinos on the Strip are still closed, the ones that were open on Saturday night were quite busy. That is especially true for Cosmopolitan and Caesars Palace.
Hundreds of gamblers flocked to the Cosmopolitan to play table games on Saturday night, only a smattering of whom were wearing masks. (Image: CardsChat News/ June 6, 2020)
Another view of the three-handed blackjack action at Cosmopolitan. (Image: CardsChat News/ June 6, 2020)
Even with the overall busy casino floor, especially the table games area and bars, the slot machine area at Cosmopolitan was a bit slow. (Image: CardsChat News/ June 6, 2020)
Foot traffic outside Caesars Palace on Saturday evening was a bit light compared to a normal weekend. (Image: CardsChat News/ June 6, 2020)
Are you starting to see a common theme here? Table games area at Caesars Palace was packed on Saturday night. Not so much in the slot areas. (Image: CardsChat News/ June 6, 2020)
Only a few guests checking in late in the evening on Saturday at Caesars Palace. The hotel lobby would normally be jam-packed. (Image: CardsChat News/ June 6, 2020)
Bellagio seemed unusually slow for a Saturday evening. You’d normally have to fight your way through this entrance at 8 pm on a Saturday. (Image: CardsChat News/ June 6, 2020)
A reasonably large crowd awaits the Bellagio fountain shows at 6:30 pm on Saturday. (Image: CardsChat News/ June 6, 2020)
Look at it while you can. You may never witness the Bellagio casino floor so empty on a Saturday evening again. (Image: CardsChat News/ June 6, 2020)
Recalibrating Coronavirus Concerns
I was cautiously optimistic about the return of the Las Vegas casinos, but also a bit skeptical. More than 112,000 people in the US have died from coronavirus. And while most of those are senior citizens, the threat is still real for those of us under 60. I’ve personally known a few people who are among the 2 million confirmed COVID-19 cases, and they each told me the experience was miserable.
So, while I’m glad to see my town reopen, I’m also concerned with a coronavirus outbreak in Nevada. My worries grew on Thursday when videos on social media showed packed casinos on Fremont Street, and it appeared few were social distancing.
But then when I actually visited the casinos later in the day, I grew less concerned in certain ways. The videos you may have seen on Twitter of a packed Fremont were misleading. They only showed a small area of the casino where customers were packed in fairly tight. Of course these are the areas scientists tell us are the biggest threat.
The truth is, however, it really wasn’t difficult to social distance in the casinos, if you chose to.
But, on the negative side, it looked like, at most 10% of the crowds wore face masks in the casinos. Still, most patrons were respectful of others and weren’t getting up into each other’s faces. People seemed to keep a safe distance from those who weren’t in their group, and the usual high-fiving that goes on inside Las Vegas casinos was non-existent.
For the most part, the busiest areas were bars and restaurants that only seated at 50% of maximum capacity, per state guidelines, and the pits. But the Nevada Gaming Control Board’s restrictions (i.e. three-handed maximum for blackjack) did help gamblers social distance even in the relatively packed table games areas.
We’re still waiting for the casinos to release data on revenue and hotel sales for the reopening weekend. And we’ll have to wait a few weeks to see if Clark County experiences any surge in new coronavirus cases.
The casinos are currently allowed to sell 30% of the total hotel rooms, and the casinos must limit capacity to 50% the maximum occupancy — though monitoring how many people enter and exit the numerous entrances at these megaresorts is virtually impossible.
Social distancing was also fairly easy given there were many areas of each casino that were empty or slow at all times. Slot machines didn’t seem as popular as usual, which may have to do with the GCB requirements that casinos remove consecutive chairs or turn off every other machine. It’s more enjoyable to play slots with a friend or companion, and it will be difficult to do that until gaming officials relax the restrictions.
source https://casinonewsblogger.com/a-frontline-view-of-reopened-casinos-photos/
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