Casinos in Manhattan? Here are the reasons that's a bad idea | Steve Israel
A casino in Times Square? Another steps from St. Patrick’s Cathedral?
Let us count the reasons why the state should not grant any of the up to three available casino licenses for its most populous, congested region, New York City and its metropolitan area.
First, the four publicly proposed Manhattan casinos.
One, backed by a private developer and Caesar’s Entertainment, would include a 950-room hotel and is slated for Times Square, in the Broadway building with “The Lion King’’ playing at the base. Another, with a developer and no announced casino partner, is envisioned near the UN on a 6-acre lot between 38th and 41st streets on First Avenue and includes a 1,000-room hotel, 1500 condos, a Ferris wheel and a so-called democracy museum. The third, with a private developer and Wynn Resorts, would go on 10 acres of the far west side’s Hudson Yards neighborhood between 30th and 40th streets and feature a 1,500-room hotel, 20 restaurants, new affordable residential buildings and a school. The fourth Manhattan casino, with no announced casino partner, would rise on the top three floors of Saks Fifth Avenue — across from St. Patrick’s Cathedral.
Just putting these proposals in writing underlines their absurdity, even before I explain why they and other metropolitan area proposals would be particularly hurtful for us in the mid-Hudson.
How would anyone outside the city get to these casinos?
Have you ever tried to drive on the West Side Highway or FDR Drive — which many of us access by squeezing into one lane for the George Washington Bridge? Have you ever tried to inch through the Lincoln or Holland tunnels?
And what about crawling through midtown traffic to the casino, which must include some sort of parking in an area where convenient parking seems as rare as beating the odds at a casino.
Wouldn’t adding more traffic defeat the purpose of the city’s proposal to reduce pollution-causing midtown traffic — congestion pricing, which could charge many drivers at least $20 to enter Manhattan below 60th Street?
As for the other metropolitan area casino proposals outside Manhattan?
One of the possibilities, which include a long shot in Coney Island and perhaps a casino complex near Citi Field, is a mammoth casino/entertainment/hotel complex on 80 acres around Long Island’s Nassau Coliseum backed by Las Vegas Sands and a private developer. Its obvious drawback: Traffic on the parking lot called the Long Island Expressway.
Then there are the two so-called front runners for the three licenses simply because they would take the least work, and time, to open.
They’re the existing racinos with electronic gambling machines and harness horse racing tracks that would be converted into full-fledged casinos: Empire City in Yonkers, owned by MGM, and Resorts World NYC in Queens, owned by Genting, the parent company of Resorts World Catskills just outside Monticello and Resorts World Hudson Valley in Newburgh.
But a state-commissioned January 2021 study said any metropolitan area casinos would hurt our decades-awaited casino, Resorts World Catskills.
“RW Catskills will be adversely impacted by any of the new developments…,” says the study by the Spectrum Gaming Group, which specifically says that “gaming revenues and the related taxes generated by (Resorts World)…can be expected to decline.”
Why would anyone in the metropolitan area drive two hours or more to gamble in the Catskills when they can gamble at a full-fledged casino in their backyards?
The gambling machine facility in Newburgh is already drawing folks who went to Resorts World Catskills, but now like gambling closer to home.
Less revenue for the Sullivan casino could mean less business for the businesses that supply it with everything from flowers to bagels. Less revenue could mean fewer tips from fewer customers for its workers. And less revenue for the casino could also mean smaller annual payments for the host municipalities of Sullivan and the Town of Thompson, along with area counties like Orange, Ulster, Dutchess and Delaware.
Who wins if the state picks up to three metropolitan area casinos?
The casinos and their developers, which will pocket billions in profits. The state, which could earn billions in licensing fees and taxes.
The rest of us?
We lose.
Steve Israel, a longtime editor and columnist at the Times Herald-Record in Orange County, New York, can be reached at steveisrael53@outlook.com.
This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Casinos in Manhattan? Here are the reasons that's a bad idea
