My last trip to Downtown Las Vegas I went for a walk down to the 7-11 at fremont just a little past Maryland Parkway. In the past some would never venture down to this area because of the throngs of homeless, prostitutes, drug dealers, and just general ne'er dowells. But this time the trip was a little different. Almost EVERY single motel on the left side of the street from the western just past the 7-11 on Fremont and 15th has been closed down, shuttered, and fenced off. This includes the famous Alicia motel where every room included a free prostitute. (don't ask me how I know this other than to say that I had a friend who lived here for a short period of time and I'll keep his name a secret so as not to out him). My question is....Did Tony Hsieh buy ALL of these little motels??? They are all fenced off. As if they came in and decided to close down all the little cheap rent by the hour operations on fremont. What are his plans for them? Tear down and build housing? Build warehouses for shoes? I feel like two ways about this. #1. This is a good thing. It will "gentrify" downtown and encourage those who were afraid to live here to give it a shot. #2. They are killing the down and out vibe of downtown and it will probably never be the same. which for most people is a good thing but for those who called these little places home they have had to move on and find another place to live. How do ya'll feel about the current state of downtowns transformation. I believe October is the official move in date for Zappos right? So next month downtown will be more hustle and bustle of "locals"?
You hot the nail on the head. They did the same in the gaslamp area here in san diego. Years ago even drunken sailors would not even gothere because it was full of porn theaters and bums. Not the old buildings are there and its a vibrant heart of the city that every tourist goes to. With of course came higher prices and fancy places to eat and drink. There are still homeless around they are just pushed down the street and around the corners. I think in downtown vegas it will only be a good thing. There is a high limit cap on downtown by the golden nugget. no place can charge more then they do because they have the nicest place so it really in a way keeps every other business in check. Even the new grand with its $58 per night rooms is about all they will be able to get out of people. So it should be a good thing that they develop an area that no one goes to and turn it into something useful for the city. It wont drive the prices up too bad i dont think. Never be like the strips anyway.
Though not all purchased by Tony H. per se, the group that he's the major investor of (Downtown Project) is responsible for much of it. This will give you the info regarding the Downtown Project: http://downtownproject.com Zappos started moving staff into the old City Hall building, with $60 million in renovation, last week.
I'm looking forward to the changes. Part of me worries that it could cause price increases and it will also bring more people to downtown but that's a small price to pay for an area that will be safer and more comfortable for us all. If you want to see a map of the properties bought by the Downtown Project, here's a link. http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2013/mar/28/downtown-project-pieces-together-90-million-llama/
Another one who supports the development. I am pretty brave but not foolish enough to venture East of The Western just two years ago (at least after 11:00 am). One of the reasons Atomic closed was that it was a crack addict hangout and no one in their right mind would have invested money into purchasing the place when ownership finally died. Last month I had a couple of beers with my wife at the reopened Atomic, left my car in the parking lot and walked to East Fremont for a small, early evening, pub crawl. Granted, this before sundown but I felt perfectly safe. No way this could have happened without Zappo's and the subsequent development.
Truth be told I have been to The Atomic bar many years ago and found it to be a little slice of heaven. It was unassuming. You didn't have to impress anyone there. MOST of the people were nice and they would buy you drinks just because you were in the bar. Of course drinks were a dollar so someone would slap a 20 on the bar and say round of drinks for everyone! In the past. We're talking late 90's. Yes it was a major crack addict hangout. But in the mid 2000's they had cleaned the place up quite a bit. Now it appears a little cookie cutter.
Hello all this is my first post on here and even though it may be a bit raunchy please don't automatically judge me. I had been to the Atomic Bar back in 2008 with my brother-in-law and my nephew during my nephews 21st birthday trip. We had went on a Saturday morning probably around 10AM. I generally like these kind of dive bars off the beaten path. The patrons and bartender where in general very polite. That being said what put me off was one of the ladies sitting at the bar having a conversation with us while we sat in one of the booths. She was making friendly small talk, where are we from, how long are you in town, things like this. She also mentioned that she was in Playboy, I'm assuming a long time ago based off her the hard living she must had lived based off her looks. Anyway the raunchy part was as she was having this friendly conversation with us she would from time to mouth but not say "I'll suck your *$%#" and would than spread open her leg while sitting on her barstool with a short skirt on. This definitely put us in an uncomfortable situation and we made a point of quickly drinking our Busch tall boy cans. The funny part was as she was mouthing this I was thinking to myself where did she propose she was going to do this, under the table at the booth, in the bathroom? Anyway you can imagine I never mentioned this story to my sister.
Just keep walking past the east on Fremont just past the old Western casino. However I think it's been gentrified so you might be out luck. That being said you might still find this lady hanging out in the back alley.