Northern NJ Casinos

I can't believe New Jersey has legalized gambling and does not have a casino in Jersey City/Newport/Hoboken.

While spending time in Jersey City I have been deterred from my favorite past-time by the distance and relative innaccesibility of Atlantic City. I just don't have time for some 3 hour bus ride.

I see AC has basically gotten crushed by PA and CT.

If NJ wants that money they should take a mental "write down" on what AC is ever going to be. From what I've read, it hasn't been revitalized in any sense by the casinos.

I think NJ would be better served to encourage those companies and people in AC to COMPETE by moving closer to a huge-ass target audience of rich mo fos.

NJ has a huge advantage over PA and CT with the 10 minute travel from midtown/lower manhattan to Hoboken.

The thing is HOboken has a great restaurant and bar scene. Big resort investment would be unnecessary. Hotels unnecessary. Just build the gambling portion and rake in billions.

How are they NOT doing this??!!?!?

 

I doubt that would ever happen

NJ has a lot riding on the success of AC and has already seen out of state competition PA,NY.CT take a bite out of the revenues.

 

this has been tried before in a place that already had a great tourist reputation, a great restaurant reputation, and plenty of hotels that were in dire need of customers

that place was New Orleans.....the hotel and restaurant owners there were not that thrilled about a land based casino at all and when one was finally allowed it was allowed with the stipulation that it would have no restaurants and no hotels

the temporary casino went broke not long after it opened.....the full sized "real" casino went broke before it even opened

http://www.nytimes.com/1996/06/02/business/a-big-casino-wager-that-hasn-t-paid-off.html?src=pm

as the article states it was pretty much a failure on all fronts for "projections"

and of course they have now built a hotel and restaurants as well after giving the old "build it and they will come" speech

that article was from 1996 when they were looking to take in 600 million annually.....no wait make that 350...no wait 300 million...it will be convenient to LOCAL hotels and a "powerful tourist draw"

they were going to pay the state of Louisiana 100 million per year and New Orleans expected 23 million

http://neworleanscitybusiness.com/thenewsroom/2012/05/17/april-a-down-month-for-new-orleans-area-casinos/

if you add March and April for Harrahs it looks like 16 years later they might be doing 275 million per year in business (true that is just two months averaged out of 12, but 16 years is a long time ago as well when they were going to deliver the above numbers)

and of course they have built a 27 story hotel and many restaurants as well which were never a part of the original plan

I believe the last paragraph in this article sums it up

http://www.nytimes.com/1999/10/31/us/new-orleans-casino-swaggers-past-the-doubts-on-opening-day.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm

''Instead of people enjoying the real sights of New Orleans, they're asking people to go inside a closed building and look at a fake New Orleans,'' said C. B. Forgotston Jr., a lawyer who has been an outspoken opponent of the casino and who predicts it will eventually beg the state to reduce its tax burden. ''Why would anyone do that? And if they did, they would just take money away from existing small businesses. It's no way to run a government.''

here they are in 2002 threatening a 3rd overall bankruptcy and a second for the "full casino" and of course getting a tax break.....unlike all the other local businesses that made New Orleans

http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/2002/Jun/22/bz/bz06a.html

here they are in 2011 failing to live up to the employment requirements of their tax breaks and going with part times and "on call" employees

http://www.ksla.com/Global/story.asp?S=13892545

just for fun if you google "Cleveland offers latest case study in urban casinos" you can see a "positive" spin on the Harrahs New Orleans property......16 years after they were going to deliver 23 million in taxes to New Orleans they are said to be delivering ALMOST 30 million...and there were "initial hurdles"....you know like going broke in the temp casino, going broke before you finished construction of the full sized casino, and then threatening to go broke 6 years later if you did not get reductions in taxes and then several years after that not responding to a report that you are not fulfilling your employment requirements......you know just small little issues like that.....not to mention you demanded a hotel and restaurants after you agreed not to.....but yea Cleveland is going to rock the house with their "urban casino".....I mean after all look what those 4 casinos in Detroit and that 175 million a year in tax revenues had done for them.....oh wait what Detroit is still broke, losing residents and still a dump

funny here is a great quote from the Cleveland article that sums up my point distinctly

Though he has no shortage of reasons why the casino has been good for Detroit, Mr. Beatty noted that he opposes an effort to put on a statewide ballot a proposal to build eight more casinos in Michigan, where more than 20 already operate.

The math, he said, speaks for itself: The annual revenue created by casinos in Michigan has not changed materially as more casinos have opened. To expand the number, the pool of people being drawn upon and the frequency with which people go to casinos would need to change, and he doubts either will.

“I think the reality of it is you will end up moving money from one pocket to the other,” Mr. Beatty said.

one would think that if 4 casinos were so great for Detroit why 8 more all over Michigan would be well almost like having GM back and making tons of money and all those cool new "green cars" that everyone wants!.....oh wait what is that people only have so much money to give away in a casino.....wow who would have ever thunk that!

here is a second great quote that has been studied and proven true in New Orleans

A Las Vegas casino “exports” goods and services produced to tourists who come from out of market, the University of Nevada, Reno's Mr. Eadington said. Ohio's casinos, meanwhile, likely will be frequented most by locals who live within a 30- to 40-mile radius.

“You're going to be cannibalizing other businesses,” he suggested. “It sucks up a lot of money that would go elsewhere in the community.”


sadly the people in Nevada still can't understand the fact that those "locals" and the FEW "people from other places" that gamble are gambling with dollars they would have eventually spend some portion (probably large portion of) or even all of in Nevada.......but now Nevada has "exported" the goods and services that they used to provide to tourist from out of market to the local market of those same tourist.......just like has happened in AC from PA......and Mississippi from Louisiana.....and on and on

casinos are not economic development tools they are economic development give ups, the casino industry is a fully mature and BEYOND mature industry that is only flushing good money after bad money down the toilet chasing the same exact dollars from place to place to place and using BS projections, un-met and pie in the sky "projections" and just outright lies to try and somehow create more business where none exist

casinos in Hoboken and all the place you mentioned would do the same thing for those places that they did for AC and just about everywhere else, but Vegas.....it would be the same place it was before with a casino and possibly worse after the politicians spend the tax revenue promises before they materialize and probably the projected new revenues from all those great new casino jobs and all those new tourist and you would watch existing businesses struggle while the casino sucks their customers into the windowless, smoke filled chamber of the mathematically challenged and then ask for tax breaks that are not going to be available to those existing smaller local businesses

total give up industry and not an builder of economies other than Vegas in the USA where they are busy ruining it with the spread of local gambling

 

Extremely interesting.

Totally changed my opinion. I'm convinced.

 

My theory is that the reason they are trying to build up the industry so aggressively out East is because the cost of flying to Vegas may get so high that they will lose those customers unless they create locals markets there. But the way it's being done sounds like a bad proposition for both the casino companies and the municipalities they are building in. I think they are all thinking they will get the next CP or Bellagio and will be dismayed to find they really ending up with at best a Gold Coast and at worst a Wild West. For all the communities getting casinos, none have appeal to me a destination, not even Cleveland where I already have family and have other reasons to go there.

As for NOLA, the people we met on our junket spent a good deal of time in the casino but they also spent time seeing the city. They didn't spend as much time seeing sights and spending money outside of the casino if they were traditional tourists but at the same time, these were folks who probably would have never gone to NOLA in the first place. The casino isn't generating all the benefits it promised but every city needs to weigh whether the trade off is worth it.

 

Didnt gamble when we went to NOLA

Theres so much more to do and see there,in Biloxi different story,casinos are the main reason people go there. I wish folks from other parts of the US would look at AC as more of a destination rather than just casinos. Theres an awful lot to see and do within an hours drive ,North Jersey, NYC and the shore ,AC areas are two different places. I do tell people to be carefull in AC proper because there is crime ,but its also easy to get in and out of to golf,fish,sightsee dine ,beach or whatever. Its not Vegas,but you cant go dolphin or whale watching in Lake Meade.

 

The simple reason is that the casino control act of NJ legalized gaming only in Atlantic County, and furthermore, only in Atlantic City. I believe a consitutional change would be required to modify it.

 

Legislators from the north want to make it a ballot issue and let the voters decide in a referendum, then the legislature will vote to change the constitution. I think it would pass because there is a greater population in the north compared to South Jersey. The governor is against gaming outside of AC as he was behind the creation of a special casino district in AC plus he just gave Revel millions in tax breaks over the next 10 years so the project could be financed. Also, the governor stripped a casino funded subsidy from the race tracks (Monmouth and Meadowlands) in last year's budget, so the Meadowlands race track wants slots to compete with places like Parx, Yonkers, and Aquaduct. AC is hurting, Revel isn't drawing customers like a $2.4 Billion casino should be, expanding gaming to the North Jersey would be just one more nail in the coffin for Atlantic City.

 

I see everyone has a lot of good points.

I just offer one outsiders opinion.

New York is full of rich people who may gamble. It is also full of average dbags like me with a small amount of money to burn gambling. AC is too far. I would venture a guess that a lot of illegal casino gambling goes on around NYC.

I guess I'm of the line of thinking that AC is dying slowly but surely. You can either let that death be for the benefit of PA and CT or NJ. I also think the market can be expanded to include those currently playing illegal games and those who would gamble, but find AC, PA, CT all too inconvenient.

Don't a lot of people here not have cars? Maybe I'm way off base and NYC is just not culturally a place with Gamblers, but it doesn't seem that way to me.

Also I might add, if NJ had anything close to a Vegas-style resort right across the river from NYC I would definitely move some of my Vegas trip here simply do to the fact there is so much more to do during the day.

There is a huge area in Newport over by the water they could put a casino resort in. The water is deep enough to dock cruise ships.

I don't see why it has to be a fancy resort, make it old school to fit some sort of Frank sinatra rat pack theme. Frank Sinatra is from Hoboken.

I guess gambling is a zero sum game and oversaturation has already occurred. I do agree with that point. I still think Northern NJ could steal enough market share to make it worthwhile.

 

AC has been struggling in this economy and the competion from north NJ would only hurt AC even more. If you have no wheels maybe rent a car? or I believe amtrak has an AC special out of Penn station NYC.
I don't think a bus trip from Jersey XCity would take 3 hours, unless the make a lot of stops to pick people up along the way. If I lived closer to you I would give you a ride..lol
I am at exit 98 on the parkway.

 

I love AC, I became a degenerate gambler....in AC. I was down this last weekend, took a walk along the ocean, popped in and out to gamble, and breathed the salt air. Vegas I love to have a fling with...but I'm married to AC>