Las Vegas is well known for its extravagance, but if a number of developers would have gotten their way it could well have been considerably more so. That’s right, alongside miniature Eiffel Towers, giant pyramids and exaggerated pirate ships could have been so much more, completely changing the look and feel of the Las Vegas Strip.
Over the years many plans have been put forward, and are still to this day, with Las Vegas bigger and better than ever thanks to the arrival of online casino LIKE Casino777 boosting the revenue of the Nevada city even more.
But what about the resorts that never quite made it to the building stage? We look back at the Las Vegas resorts that could have been, but never were…
Desert Kingdom
Desert Kingdom would have been a truly majestic resort and would have at the time been a real game-changer in Las Vegas. At the time there were no real mega resorts along the Strip and it would have been the first of its kind had it opened when planned in 1997 on the site where the Wynn and Encore now stand.
At a cost of $750million, the resort would have included a hotel and casino space alongside a huge theme park, a riverboat ride and a lagoon water show, which we would later see with the Bellagio.
ITT Sheraton, who were planning the project, eventually decided against it though, instead buying Caesars Palace and turning that into the powerhouse Las Vegas casino it is today.
The Titanic
Plans for a Titanic themed hotel sank like, well, the Titanic back in 1999 when plans for a $1.2billion resort were revealed based around the ill-fated “unsinkable” ship. It would have been a hugely impressive resort though and a real hit with tourists, particularly given the success of the movie.
It would have been docked where the Fashion Show Mall is today, and would have included a 400ft long replica ship complete with iceberg. Inside you’d find 1,200 hotel rooms as well as The Ice Breaker, which was planned to be a world-class nightclub facility.
London Resort & Casino
We already have Venice, New York and Paris in Las Vegas, so why not London? The USA loves British culture and it would have been the perfect resort to have on the Strip. A British themed park has already proven a success in Florida, so a 535ft replica of the Houses of Parliament slap bang in the middle of the Nevada desert would have surely been welcomed.
Tower Bridge and the London Eye would have been acknowledged in the huge resort, which would have also included 2,000 hotel rooms, 90,000 square feet of casino floor and a huge shopping and restaurant area which would have replicated British streets and neighbourhoods.
Xanadu
Xanadu would have been another resort that would have completely revolutionised Las Vegas and brought a number of features to the Strip much earlier than they would have. Proposed in the 1970s on the land where the Excalibur now stands, it would have been a pyramid-like building that would have been among the biggest on the Strip at the time. It was set to have a huge central atrium, similar to the Luxor today, as well as a convention centre, casino, showroom and more.
Priced at $150million, plans eventually fell through because at the time the city’s sewer lines simply wouldn’t have been able to manage with the 1,700 hotel rooms, as well as other amenities, proposed for the site.