The Much Improved State of Vegas' 9/11 Memorial

What a difference a few days and a blog post can make. Here's what Las Vegas' 9/11 Memorial at the corner of the Strip and Tropicana looked like on 9/8.


It was shameful, given the proximity to the anniversary of 9/11. New York-New York maintenance folks were responsible for managing it, a deed the property voluntarily took on when they created this monument in 2002. Artifacts -- T-shirts, messages, notes, etc. -- that were left at the base of our Statue of Liberty for months after the 9/11 attacks were collected and archived at UNLV. They are to be presented in these display cases regularly, rotated as needed.

But when I was there a couple days before 9/11, nine of the boxes were empty and most of the other items were so faded as to be unreadable.

Well, as of Thursday, look:


All filled, all new stuff!

I asked MGM Resorts why the monument had been allowed to fall into such disrepair in the first place. Yvette Monet, a corporate spokeswoman, answered:

At the time the photos were taken on Wednesday night, we were in the middle of our routine maintenance process where we replace plexiglass and the memento items, thus the empty cases. The cases get very high exposure to sunlight and so the items fade quickly, and we switch them out frequently. The lighting in the cases is currently being evaluated.

I guess I don't understand why they would remove some items if they didn't have others to replace them with. That seems inefficient. We're talking about a bunch of T-shirts, not some big, hard-to-carry items. Bring out the new stuff when you take the screwdriver to the boxes and remove the old ones, right? Also, I had been there on July 8 when those gay activists shut down the Strip with banners and I noticed several boxes empty then, too, although not nearly as many. So this is an on-going thing.

Anyhow, glad it's fixed. Let's hope they don't let it go again, even for a few days.

The Sorry State of Vegas' 9/11 Memorial

One of the first stories I covered when I returned to Vegas in August 2002 to freelance from here was a firefighters union convention at which the New York-New York resort announced with great fanfare they would be carving out a plaza in front of Vegas' Statue of Liberty for a Sept. 11 memorial.

They did so, creating 21 lit glass boxes that were to hold items that were left at the base of the Statue of Liberty in the weeks and months after the 9/11 attacks. They included T-shirts and gear from fire and police departments around the world as well as cards and signs, a steady stream of which reflected the worldwide outpouring and the desperate need people had to find some symbolic way to pay tribute.

New York-New York did it, yes, and they've been so demur about it that they don't even squawk about it on their website for fear of seeming to be trying to take advantage of the suffering of that day. It was, I believe, the first permanent 9/11 Memorial in the nation.

Yet on Wednesday night, I noticed nearly half of those lit displays are presently empty. This is strange because there were thousands of objects saved and archived at UNLV, where they sit in boxes waiting to be rotated into the display. Many of the items that are still in the memorial exhibit have become so faded that you can't read them anyway and probably should be replaced.

The responsibility for the upkeep belongs to the maintenance department at New York-New York, owned by MGM Resorts International. I didn't have a chance today to inquire as to why the memorial has been left in such disarray, but I did want to put this out there now because the ninth anniversary of the attacks is upon us. One would think that whatever the cause of the problems over there, someone would think that for that particular occasion, the memorial ought to be in tip-top shape. Right?

Is There A 9/11 Room Rate Discount?

Here's this week's LVW column...

The price is … strange

Room rates take a curious plunge right around the anniversary of 9-11

By STEVE FRIESS

I am not one of those 9-11 conspiracy nuts. I have an eccentric British pal who does believe that George W. Bush, despite his incompetence at ordering in lunch, was behind the most horrific events of our time. This friend is constantly forwarding e-mails asserting that the Baltimore family behind Vegas casino implosions actually imploded the World Trade Center and made it look to the stupid people of the world as if some “hijacked” airplanes caused their fall.

I reject all this, so I’m sane, right?

Well, maybe. But I won’t hold it against you if you wonder about me after I tell you this:

I am a 9-11 Vegas-hotel-discount conspiracy nut.

Stay with me for a moment. Something weird is going on around here.

About a week ago, for reasons I can’t even recall, I took a look at room rates in September at the MGM Grand. I was surprised to notice that in the week of September 7, the resort’s rates fell to their lowest level of the entire month—$100 a night—on that Thursday. That Thursday is the seventh anniversary of the terror attacks. Every other Thursday that month, the rates were the highest of the Monday to Thursday rates. During that particular, auspicious week, the rates fall dramatically.

Odd, thought I. Could it really be that, lo these many years later, there’s still some residual impact on occupancy because people prefer not to travel or recreate on that date?

My brain said no, but my heart said yes, so the next thing I knew, I was obsessively scanning hotels.com to see if other resorts on the Strip saw similar dips on 9/11/08. Here is the list of resorts that see unusual room-rate drops on that Thursday: Luxor, Bally’s, Harrah’s, Bellagio, New York-New York, Treasure Island, Paris, The Mirage, Mandalay Bay, Las Vegas Hilton, Golden Nugget, the Rio, Hard Rock, Wynn and Trump. There may be more.

The Mandalay Bay and Hard Rock were particularly startling. At Mandalay Bay, the room rate is $210 Sunday through Wednesday, then $120 on Thursday, a $90 drop. At the Hard Rock, the rates are $299 Monday through Wednesday and $109 on Thursday. That’s a $190 decrease! The Wynn is also kind of odd: The rate all that week and the week after is $499 per night except on September 11, when it’s $399.

Read the rest HERE

The Stardust and 9/11 - a connection???

Oh, dear. I have been proved wrong. In my interview with Stardust imploder Mark Loizeaux aired on a special edition of "The Strip" earlier this week, he made reference to being constantly accused of being part of a gov't conspiracy, that he frequently gets attacked as the agent of the gov't who brought down the World Trade Center and Murrah federal building in OK City.

I didn't quite believe him. Seemed far-fetched. And then some nutjob left this comment as a response to my Stardust piece and photo-video package that was posted on Wired News late yesterday:

Now this was an obvious controlled demolition. I've seen this on the news at a different angle where the lighting was better but still in this video you can see at the bottom left side of the building blowouts or "Squibs" from taking out the building's colums from inside. This is what needs to happen so that structure can collapse. Does this remind anyone of anything? Perhaps ummm The WTC twin towers 1 and 2? If you don't believe me there is plenty of video footage of these blowouts or the technical term, "squibs" from both Towers when they were collapsing as well. Don't think I'm just making this up, see for yourself. Go find the Network footage on the internet with these things in there. -- Ed

I'm not even sure how to respond. I invite you to do so.