Perhaps the most memorable feature of Downtown Las Vegas is the 90ft-high metal canopy covering four blocks of Fremont Street with its hourly sound and light performances. Constructed to bring back the tourists to the Downtown casinos, the so-called Fremont Street Experience was successfully launched in 1995. Now it is time to tear it down and for Downtown to reinvent itself – or so says Geoff Schumacher, author of Sun, Sin & Suburbia: An Essential History of Modern Las Vegas.

Citing the ability of the Strip to recognize that gambling is only part of a modern Las Vegas, Schumacher stresses the need for Fremont Street to attract the locals in order to remain viable. Just as in the ‘90s the casino properties there saw the need for drastic action in order to compete with the big themed casinos on the Strip, Downtown now needs another rethink to create a vibrant scene that will bring back both tourist and local dollars. It would seem that attracting the locals is the key to Fremont Street’s long-term future, and to do that the design must offer a more enticing atmosphere.

It is the quality retail outlets and restaurants, shows and nightlife that are bringing new life to areas such as the Strip and Green Valley Ranch in mixed-use developments. The population in Las Vegas is expanding rapidly and Downtown must stake its claim as a place the locals go to eat, gamble, shop and be entertained. For that to happen Geoff Schumacher says the Fremont Street decision-makers must be “willing to take the kind of risks that have become routine on the Strip.” (E-08.23.05)

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