Back when I was playing a lot of Blackjack in Las Vegas, one of my favorite casinos (i.e., a place where I usually won) was the Imperial Palace. The I.P., as most folks called it, was an interesting place. It had a great location, good gambling rules and — if this kind of thing matters to you — a lot of cute Asian dealers. It also had a shabby casino, dreadful restaurants, Paleolithic elevators, barely adequate rooms and, as if all that weren't enough, there were reports that that the man who owned it was a big fan of Hitler and threw private parties each year to celebrate ol' Adolf's birthday. This last one was unconvincingly denied but the other drawbacks could not be.
Since I was playing there a lot, I got a lot of comps for free rooms as well as offers to let them fly me in and give me an R.F.B. comp (room, food, beverage) if I'd "give them some action." That was the term they used for "gamble at our casino," and it made me think of all sorts of actions I could perform that they wouldn't particularly like. I never took them up on the free airfare and meals because after staying two or three times gratis at the I.P., I decided I'd rather spend the money and sleep in a hotel where the cockroaches are smaller than the bellhops.
That should give you some idea how crummy the Imperial Palace was. I wouldn't even stay there for free. An exec at a competing hotel once told me the following, and I can't swear this is true but it sounds true. It's that to get certain of their high rollers to fly in and gamble at their establishment, the Imperial Palace had to offer to put them up across the street at Caesars Palace and pay for meals over there. It was like, "Come to Vegas! We love you so much, we won't make you stay at our hotel!"
So now comes the news that the I.P. is probably history. The Harrah's Corporation has been buying up properties on that side of The Strip. They already own the Flamingo Hilton (soon to lose its surname), O'Shea's, Bally's, Paris and, of course, Harrah's. They also recently purchased (and closed) a small hotel around the corner called Bourbon Street and acquired the shopping center nearby that includes the famous local restaurant, Battista's Hole-in-the-Wall. This week, they spent $370 million to obtain the Imperial Palace, which sounds cheap to me given the location of such prime real estate, but high given that it's such a rathole.
Harrah's has stated they will continue to operate the I.P. while they weigh various options. This roughly translates to: "We're gonna keep the doors open at this dump until we figure out just what we're going to put in its place." The building will almost certainly be razed, which may be happy news for everyone who goes to Vegas except for those who coveted getting such cheap rooms in such an ideal location. But it also raises a few questions…
One is what will become of the Imperial Palace's incredible auto collection, which was one of the few reasons to venture into the place if you weren't gambling. The cars were not included in the transaction. They're owned by an outside party and the museum will continue for now. But will it figure into whatever future plans are devised for whatever occupies that land? Oddly enough, the Harrah's organization has an interesting history with automotive museums, having operated one for years in Reno. (Much of that collection now forms the basis of The National Automobile Museum, also in Reno.) Maybe they'll find a place for all those neat Duesenbergs.
And what will become of Legends in Concert, the pretty-good impersonator show at the I.P. which was just about the only other reason to go in there? I'd hate to see all those Blues Brothers look-alikes and Madonna clones out on the street.
What will happen to the drainage on the Las Vegas Strip? That sounds like a strange concern but on those occasional days when a heavy rainstorm hits the town, an amazing amount of water has been known to cascade through the Imperial Palace parking lot. I was staying there one day when a monster storm hit and from my window, I could look down at a river in the garage below, with cars that were two-thirds submerged for a little while. Whatever the Harrah's people have in mind for that property, they're going to have to factor in that little problem.
Lastly, how will they demolish the place? Most old Vegas hotels when they come down, come down in a glorious implosion/explosion and folks gather to watch and sometimes plan trips just to be there when it happens. But this one is right between Harrah's and O'Shea's, and I'm thinking they can't drop it the way they've nuked the others….not that it would take a lot. The last time I stayed there, I got the feeling you could bring down the entire hotel just by slamming a closet door real hard.