MA Casino Developments

[BosDevelop]

The quality of the people will be more scumbag, degerate, gambling junkies, along with lowest of the low and prostitutes, in the area than quality customers.

Congrats, you managed to hit nearly every standard anti-gambling argument in one sentence. Guess what, those "scumbag, degenerate, gambling junkies..." can be found on every corner in nearly every town in the Commonwealth scratching away at their scratch tickets, filling in their keno numbers and playing other lottery games right after they meet up with and/or call their bookies. If you have spent any time at the Connecticut casinos, you would realize that 99% of the customers are regular, law abiding people looking for some form of entertainment.

 

[TheRifleman]

Congrats, you managed to hit nearly every standard anti-gambling argument in one sentence. Guess what, those "scumbag, degenerate, gambling junkies..." can be found on every corner in nearly every town in the Commonwealth scratching away at their scratch tickets, filling in their keno numbers and playing other lottery games right after they meet up with and/or call their bookies. If you have spent any time at the Connecticut casinos, you would realize that 99% of the customers are regular, law abiding people looking for some form of entertainment.

But the casinos are also providing false hope besides the poor soul that is a weekly degerate spending 10 bucks on a lottery ticket or owing a bookie 100 bucks for the week. Now he can lose his entire paycheck and completely be demoralized in that area. Do you really believe that a casino is a good idea compared to people scratching dollar tickets and playing $1 keno?

 

[BosDevelop]

But the casinos are also providing false hope besides the poor soul that is a weekly degerate spending 10 bucks on a lottery ticket or owing a bookie 100 bucks for the week. Now he can lose his entire paycheck and completely be demoralized in that area. Do you really believe that a casino is a good idea compared to people scratching dollar tickets and playing $1 keno?

I believe that individuals should make their own decisions when it comes to the lawful expenditures of their finances. If someone has a gambling addiction, they are going to gamble no matter what avenue they choose to feed that addiction be it lottery games, on line sports betting etc. For every addict that will lose their entire paycheck in one of these casinos, they are a 1,000 citizens who are just looking to blow off some steam and have some adult fun with like-minded responsible adults. Yes, it is possible for people to view a casino for what it is, entertainment and not a place to make money.

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

But the casinos are also providing false hope besides the poor soul that is a weekly degerate spending 10 bucks on a lottery ticket or owing a bookie 100 bucks for the week. Now he can lose his entire paycheck and completely be demoralized in that area. Do you really believe that a casino is a good idea compared to people scratching dollar tickets and playing $1 keno?

You're confronted a little more face-to-face with a gambling problem than in a convenience store scratching quick-picks. A little more immediacy when you get up and go to a place explicitly for gambling to gamble instead of some generic place like a store or Keno bar to do the same, or some internet poker site. I'd argue the lottery and forms of gambling you do on neutral turf are a lot more corrosive to the poor and desperate than a casino. Going to the casino is more of an "event" you have to justify with the family and explicitly think about in terms of money you have to spend. It's not like anyone wanders into a casino to buy today's newspaper from the gift shop and then says, "Oh hell, I might as well play a few games of craps while I'm in the neighborhood." That's exactly what the hook is when people buy scratch tickets...make it a subsconscious decision to someone out on a trip for something else.

Casinos today are a lot more like Foxwoods than run-down Atlantic City or the sad sacks who used to hang around Wonderland all day. It's gone upscale. There's not enough return on investment to target the lowest common denominator unless it's a place maintaining current business. To build a new one and attract all new business from scratch means targeting the upwardly mobile and doing it in a way that's all mixed-development entertainment like Foxwoods instead of just this place you go to to do nothing but gamble. I don't gamble, but I've spent a whole day at Foxwoods before not-gambling and have never been at a shortage of things to do. But that's also the hook...build an all-in-one "entertainment destination", then get people who normally wouldn't wager to do a little gambling while they're there. But it's decidedly upscale...the destitute are not going to get up and plan a day trip to Bob Kraft's Big Patriot Funland to make all their dreams come true. They're going to do it at the corner store under the guise of being frugal.

It's a slippery slope, no doubt, but I guarantee there's more brainrot to come out of expanding the ubiquity of the lottery even further than building some big expensive palace out in Eastie.



(For personal preference I'd rather it be out in Foxboro. But that's just because I don't want to get flattened by any number of barely-legal casino tourbus operators jumping the curb through downtown. Those things are a fucking terror on the roads. And they're everywhere...especially in the left lane.)

 

[BosDevelop]

You're confronted a little more face-to-face with a gambling problem than in a convenience store scratching quick-picks. A little more immediacy when you get up and go to a place explicitly for gambling to gamble instead of some generic place like a store or Keno bar to do the same, or some internet poker site. I'd argue the lottery and forms of gambling you do on neutral turf are a lot more corrosive to the poor and desperate than a casino. Going to the casino is more of an "event" you have to justify with the family and explicitly think about in terms of money you have to spend. It's not like anyone wanders into a casino to buy today's newspaper from the gift shop and then says, "Oh hell, I might as well play a few games of craps while I'm in the neighborhood." That's exactly what the hook is when people buy scratch tickets...make it a subsconscious decision to someone out on a trip for something else.

Casinos today are a lot more like Foxwoods than run-down Atlantic City or the sad sacks who used to hang around Wonderland all day. It's gone upscale. There's not enough return on investment to target the lowest common denominator unless it's a place maintaining current business. To build a new one and attract all new business from scratch means targeting the upwardly mobile and doing it in a way that's all mixed-development entertainment like Foxwoods instead of just this place you go to to do nothing but gamble. I don't gamble, but I've spent a whole day at Foxwoods before not-gambling and have never been at a shortage of things to do. But that's also the hook...build an all-in-one "entertainment destination", then get people who normally wouldn't wager to do a little gambling while they're there. But it's decidedly upscale...the destitute are not going to get up and plan a day trip to Bob Kraft's Big Patriot Funland to make all their dreams come true. They're going to do it at the corner store under the guise of being frugal.

It's a slippery slope, no doubt, but I guarantee there's more brainrot to come out of expanding the ubiquity of the lottery even further than building some big expensive palace out in Eastie.



(For personal preference I'd rather it be out in Foxboro. But that's just because I don't want to get flattened by any number of barely-legal casino tourbus operators jumping the curb through downtown. Those things are a fucking terror on the roads. And they're everywhere...especially in the left lane.)

Excellent post especially in regards to the dangerousness of lottery games over the "event" nature of going to a casino.

 

[GW2500]

Most of you know me as a nominally pro-development, pro-business guy. This proposal is a loser for Boston, and a total pig-fuck for the people who have to live near it. We're not talking about shadows on a park in February anymore. If the owners of Suffolk Downs decided to close the track and develop it as a large mixed-use TOD with thousands of units of mixed-market housing, and office and retail space, I'd walk over there with a shovel.

So if this was actually done nicely, pretty architecture and what not, do you think it still wouldn't be successful?

 

[mass88]

I have to kind of laugh at the anti-casino arguments at times. People can walk into any number of bars, restaurants, super markets, convenience stores, liquor stores, etc. and buy scratch tickets, lotto tickets and play powerball. I had a friend growing up who worked at a Tedeschi's and he would always mention the number of people that would come in every week, or multiple times every week, or even every day and buy all of the mentioned gambling opinions.

As far as prostitution is concerned, it happens every where and will continue to happen, casino or not. People make it seem like you are going to have scantily clad women just hawking themselves out in the open, blatantly in a casino. As far as I am concerned, prostitution is the least worrying of the strikes against casinos and should not even be worried about.

 

[TheRifleman]

Casinos today are a lot more like Foxwoods than run-down Atlantic City or the sad sacks who used to hang around Wonderland all day. It's gone upscale. But it's decidedly upscale...the destitute are not going to get up and plan a day trip to Bob Kraft's Big Patriot Funland to make all their dreams come true. They're going to do it at the corner store under the guise of being frugal.

)

This was a good post.

"sad sacks who used to hang around Wonderland all day"
I'm on the floor laughing.
I guess the entire issue I have is does the Casino in the end demoralizes it's surrounding environment.

I think the public leaders should negotiate that the casino needs to invest a certain amount of profits into the area, parks, education programs, police security and help the area move forward in a positive direction. I just don't think Casinos end up being this way. Even Foxwoods the Enteratainment Mecca of Connecticut. Driving around the area it looks just BLAH

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

I have to kind of laugh at the anti-casino arguments at times. People can walk into any number of bars, restaurants, super markets, convenience stores, liquor stores, etc. and buy scratch tickets, lotto tickets and play powerball. I had a friend growing up who worked at a Tedeschi's and he would always mention the number of people that would come in every week, or multiple times every week, or even every day and buy all of the mentioned gambling opinions.

As far as prostitution is concerned, it happens every where and will continue to happen, casino or not. People make it seem like you are going to have scantily clad women just hawking themselves out in the open, blatantly in a casino. As far as I am concerned, prostitution is the least worrying of the strikes against casinos and should not even be worried about.

"Neutral" sites also don't have the security forces of a full-on casino, who for their own reputations need to stay as squeaky clean as possible on the vice they may attract. I much doubt you'll see throngs of hookers lining Route 1. In Puritan suburban Massachusetts that's like pasting a sign to themselves saying "Arrest me and confiscate my day's wages!" To the extent that they thrive at Mohegan Sun it's only the ones deft enough to get in and evade every security camera and staffer who's gone through hard intel training to spot prostitute-like behavior in a crowded room. Those casinos are like Israeli airport security at sniffing out telltale signs. No...it'll always be easier to find one on Lansdowne St., the Theater District, or Copley Marriott any night of the week than somewhere they'll either stick out like a sore thumb or every staffer within miles will be looking for them. The city already has multiple thriving red light districts. They're called BU and Northeastern, where the escort listings are the way a couple hundred or more of the city's brightest luminaries of higher education pay back their crushing student loan debts.

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

This was a good post.

"sad sacks who used to hang around Wonderland all day"
I'm on the floor laughing.
I guess the entire issue I have is does the Casino in the end demoralizes it's surrounding environment.

I think the public leaders should negotiate that the casino needs to invest a certain amount of profits into the area, parks, education programs, police security and help the area move forward in a positive direction. I just don't think Casinos end up being this way. Even Foxwoods the Enteratainment Mecca of Connecticut. Driving around the area it looks just BLAH

Foxwoods and Mohegan are poor comparisons for integrated development because of the tribal land. Legally they couldn't build at all outside their soil, so that bunkered them in. The extended development that came later were just leeching off the bunkers.

There is no way something like that will get built on taxable MA land. Too many agencies involved that they'll have to satisfy, including the BRA ogre if there's one inside city limits. And Kraft is not going to build a Funland bunker. All of the development he's been trying to do around Patriot Place has been to try to get a little mixed action in there to attract a non-gameday crowd. He not only knows that his own profits are dependent on trying to get something regionally integrated, but also that he's got legions of pols and locals waiting to cut him down if he doesn't present a plan they can appropriate to their own means.

If it were at all easy to build a casino outside of tribal land where the bunker mentality is the only way and national independence lowers the barrier, or outside of a resort city that has "integrated" (after a fashion) casino development on a wide scale...there'd be a lot more casinos dotting every region. But there isn't, because they're freaking hard to build. If it were only a matter of legalizing it, then somebody immediately coming in and building one...every state would've legalized it. Hand-wringing about vice vs. tax revenue doesn't exactly wash when there stalks Powerball and the limitlessly expanding lotteries. Pols are about money, not morals, every time...especially when it's about morals. They hand-wring over legalizing because if they go through that fight they better get a casino built or it'll be hugely embarrassing and politically damaging to have the debate for nothing. This got passed because they thought--correctly, I think--that the available proposals were real enough to get built and survive the rigors they've got to go through to satisfy the integrated development factions.


There aren't too many places where a law passed successfully gets a casino erected that makes all the players look good in the end. I remember the Hartford one that Wynn proposed 20 years ago when they nearly lured the Patriots. He habitually spreads his chips around and proposes new casinos in places where public money/permission is being considered. Then pulls out because almost always the auxiliary revenues don't look good enough to proceed, or look worse than if he built a new shrine in a bona fide casino city. Playing the market smartly with managed risk on Wynn's part...political suicide on everyone else's. Hence, the hand-wringing in most places that goes on for years and usually doesn't amount to a change in the law except...more endless expansion of the state lottery, Keno, etc. There are a whole lot of good-on-paper opportunities that end up looking like a Hartford when the planning goes deeper, and developers in the gaming industry know how to play prospective markets. If it doesn't work, they walk away and don't get nearly as deep in before bailing as they would a conventional development. A few places like Hartford learned the hard way how the casino real estate market sizes up its expansion opportunities.



If I had to predict, Kraft's is the one that'll get built. He satisfies the money and power grab amongst all the money and power grabbers, and offers up the least resistance to approval because Foxboro's already so dependent on his tax revenue that the resident opposition (unfortunately) is very easily steamrolled. Conversely, I'd be kind of shocked if one got built in Boston because of...the BRA, and its unparalleled ability to turn all it touches into permanent vaporware. Patrick didn't just put his reputation on the line for vaporware. Might end up that a project that maybe shouldn't be built in Boston...not ending up being built in Boston...ends up being the most damning indictment of all the things that should be built in Boston but aren't.

 

[whighlander]

Foxwoods and Mohegan are poor comparisons for integrated development because of the tribal land. Legally they couldn't build at all outside their soil, so that bunkered them in. The extended development that came later were just leeching off the bunkers....


If I had to predict, Kraft's is the one that'll get built. He satisfies the money and power grab amongst all the money and power grabbers, and offers up the least resistance to approval because Foxboro's already so dependent on his tax revenue that the resident opposition (unfortunately) is very easily steamrolled. Conversely, I'd be kind of shocked if one got built in Boston because of...the BRA, and its unparalleled ability to turn all it touches into permanent vaporware.

F-Line -- Wynn is to Casino as X is to Football

Answer is X= Patriots -- Steve Wynn does his homework, builds a good team, and unusally gets the project to the end-zone successfully

And it is all first class -- perhaps he got his busines instincts from Reveah (his parents were from there) -- but he got his relevant experience and expertise building in Las Vegs during the heyday of the destination casino -- aka the Mirage, Caesars, Excalibur, Belagio, Mandalay Bay etc.

See for example Wynn as Vegas his flagship hotel
http://www.zimbio.com/Las+Vegas+Vacations/articles/BlYO509M7Fh/Top+10+Las+Vegas+Hotels

3131 Las Vegas Blvd. South,
Las Vegas, NV, 89109
Since it's opening in April 2005, Wynn Las Vegas continues to set new standards for pre-eminent luxury in Las Vegas. The 50-story, 2,716-room Wynn Las Vegas prides itself on its ability to provide an exceptional guest experience.
The Forbes Five-Star, AAA Five Diamond award-winning resort offers award-winning accommodations, signature restaurants, exciting leisure activities and nightly entertainment.

You know that with Wynn's money and Krafts prestige and image / legassy that what will be built on the other side of Rt-1 from Gillete Stadium will be a masterwork integrated development complimenting Patriort Place and maaking Foxboro a year-round 24X7 venue

I would imagine in 10 years:
casino
hotels
convention center
restaurants
shops
music / performance facilties (indoor and outdoor)
Major Transit stop (Boston, Providence, Worcester)

The T will run regularly to Foxboro not just as a in-bound commuter service, but also as an outbound reverse commuter service

Suffolk and Menino will get the consolation prize of a Twin Rivers style slots facility with a smaller hotel complex focused on the local better and people North of Boston

 

[whighlander]

Foxwoods and Mohegan are poor comparisons for integrated development because of the tribal land. Legally they couldn't build at all outside their soil, so that bunkered them in. The extended development that came later were just leeching off the bunkers.

F-Line actually the indians can just as anyone else build where ever they want if they meet the local permitting, etc.-- the legal benefit of the tribal land is that on the tribal land they are free to nearly do what they chose to do as long as it doesn't violatate Federal Bureau of Indian Affairs regulations

For example one of the two Indian tribe casino opperators in CT is part of a proposal to build a casino in Palmer -- (the Western MA casino permitted by MA

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

F-Line actually the indians can just as anyone else build where ever they want if they meet the local permitting, etc.-- the legal benefit of the tribal land is that on the tribal land they are free to nearly do what they chose to do as long as it doesn't violatate Federal Bureau of Indian Affairs regulations

For example one of the two Indian tribe casino opperators in CT is part of a proposal to build a casino in Palmer -- (the Western MA casino permitted by MA

They can now. In the 90's they couldn't build off their own land until the laws were relaxed for all the ancillary development spilling outside their borders. I remember being in middle school in CT in 1990 when the Pequots were squaring off with the state about first building Foxwoods. Huge controversy, all kinds of sweaty palms and doom and gloom portent. I must've done like 3 different term papers on it whenever we had some current events thing to do for class. MA's passage is completely anticlimactic relative to how tense it was 20 years ago. But Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun raised the bar. Nobody fears a dank Atlantic City mob joint in New England anymore. On pure dollars and cents no developer could ever make a profit off that. The competition's been very, very good for narrowing the field to only the most serious Wynns of the world and all this super-integrated development. A little too bad that a whole lot of other super-integrated development hasn't happened because it takes a casino boss to overpower all the dysfunction and get timely consensus, but we'll probably get a good reference project for how quality integration should be done out of it.


Now, about those casinobus drivers. . .

 

[DominusNovus]

I spend most of my time in various convenience stores, for work. I feel somewhat qualified to echo the sentiments regarding the amount of gambling going on at c-stores: loads.

Next time you're grabbing yourself a slim jim, check out the wall where they brag about all the winning tickets they've sold.

Or find one of the stores where they've got half the floor area devoted to standing tables for people to huddle around the keno monitor. Those places aren't convenience stores, they're gambling parlors that happen to sell junk food and cigarettes.

Not to speak ill of those businesses, but if you want to find degenerate gamblers of lower means, thats where you find them. Not at the Casinos.

 

[datadyne007]

"Don't you know the lottery is just a tax on stupid people?"

-Brian Griffin

 

[Lurker]

Not to speak ill of those businesses, but if you want to find degenerate gamblers of lower means, thats where you find them. Not at the Casinos.

-yet

I take it you never went to Wonderland or have been to Suffolk Downs before?

The whole moral movement against the common vices of the poor isn't always about some snobbery, it is in part motivated by an observation that many people wouldn't be poor if they weren't frittering away excess capital on vices rather than investing it into creating additional wealth.

 

[jass]

Thanks. I am still torn on what the casino will do to the quality of life in Eastie, so i ultimately defer to the residents. I've considered moving to East Boston, and I am torn on what the casino would mean. My main hang up has been the water crossing to downtown. As someone without a car, it would be very limiting, especially going out late at night (see my recent posts in the T service thread). The casino may enhance transportation- like cheap all night water taxis and shuttles to the Casino as a way of bringing in more patrons. But as a residnet, that would be a huge benefit in getting from downtown or southie. That service might beget new residential developments (since the waterfront and suffolk downs are divided by the airport). So it really could in some scenarios be a boon for Eastie in several ways.

Taxis would be more willing to go that way, because itll be easier to find a fare who wants to go back.

The casino could be forced to pay to extend the Blue line to Lynn and operate night buses.

 

[SeamusMcFly]

and remember when I got caught stealing all those watches from Sears... Well you have a gambling problem!

 

[statler]

Question, outside of places like Monte Carlo are there any purpose built casinos that are known for their architecture?

I'm not referring to places like New York, New York, which are notable for their absurdity, but buildings that would be remarkable regardless of what was housed inside of them.

 

[Shepard]

Marina Bay in Singapore?

I think the more interesting question is whether there are purpose-built casinos in an urban setting that contribute positively to the urban fabric, especially at street level?