The Stardust is gone...

[MonkeyFunk]

LAS VEGAS - The venerable Stardust casino-hotel on the Las Vegas Strip was imploded early Tuesday morning in a hail of fireworks to make way for Boyd Gaming Corp.’s $4.4 billion megaresort Echelon.

The property, known for its bargain rooms, friendly service and mobbed-up past, opened on July 2, 1958, billing itself as the world’s largest resort hotel with 1,032 rooms.

It is also credited with being Las Vegas’ first mass-market casino, thanks to cheap rates and loss-leading food and drinks.



http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17590023/


Gah! Vegas just ain't the same anymore.

[blogslut]

1. Sigh

It all started when they took down the Silver Slipper"

[MonkeyFunk]

2. sigh....

Vegas is a whole new town now.

[pinniped]

3. They blew away the Sands shortly after the last time I saw it.

Had I known it was going to be blown to smithereens, I would have taken some pics.

[wuushew]

4. I really can't shed tears for businesses that exist to bilk people out of money

Gambling is nothing more than paying for the excitement of earning a negative return.

[MonkeyFunk]

5. Then

you know nothing about Vegas and what it was.

I hereby slap you with a haddock.

[Bluebear]

9. You're lots of fun at parties, aren't you?

;)

[Bluebear]

10. .

[BurtWorm]

6. Glad I got to see it before it went.

It had some of the prettiest lights on the strip.

[MonkeyFunk]

7. in its day

it was great. Isn't that where Wayne Newton's been playing the last hundred years or so?

[ReadTomPaine]

8. Vegas consumes itself regularly...

there is less regard for the town's history than one might expect for such a famous, longstanding tourist destination. Every decade or so, its image is remade anew and these sorts of things are turned into media events rather than items of concern.

It's telling that when I visited a few years back, the areas and venues that spoke to the history of Vegas were easily the least populated of the tourist spots I visited - almost empty in fact. That town thrives on reinventing itself.

[Bluebear]

11. VIDEO here >>>>

http://www.vegasrex.com/video/stardust_implosion.wmv

[Adelante]

12. That's a shame