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Las Vegas is a city that has everything – thrills, entertainment, food, and of course a lot of people. But what it doesn’t seem to have despite all of the tourists and the people that live there is a mass transit system. Let’s design one!
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Ever wondered why your city’s transit just doesn’t seem quite up to snuff? RMTransit is here to answer that, and help you open your eyes to all of the different public transportation systems around the world!
Reece (the RM in RMTransit) is an urbanist and public transport critic residing in Toronto, Canada, with the goal of helping the world become more connected through metros, trams, buses, high-speed trains, and all other transport modes.
49 Comments
Since a lot of people are commenting, the monorail presents a lot of issues. It mostly travels behind casinos on one side of the strip, making access very difficult. It also runs a bad service at a pretty high fare. Vegas ideally would have more speed capacity and connectivity!
I'd say elevated tracks will take up a lot of space reducing the attractiveness of the land the street currently occupies. going underground and removing large pats of the street would be a better overall solution. who needs all those lanes, if tourists mainly use the metro?
monorail should have ran down the middle of the stip from the airport to downtown.
I found the bus from the airport to the strip to be fairly easy to navigate…but I also take transit pretty much wherever I go. I've met friends there and they didn't even realize it was possible to take the bus for a few bucks. They took a taxi.
Mass transit makes no sense for locals. We live in suburbs. We are all spread out over a large valley. It's extremely hot here. People don't want to walk an hour to a bus stop and stand there in the hot sun for half an hour waiting for a bus full of smelly sweaty people who don't wash their clothes. City buses are often full of homeless people who ride the bus to get out of the heat. Mass transit in Las Vegas sucks and the people who live here don't want to pay for it. What you propose would cost billions and billions of dollars. Who's going to pay for it? The tourists are not going to fund this. It will be the locals paying for it and they get the least benefit from it. There are plenty of shuttles on the strip already. Pedestrian bridges save lives. The streets are far too wide to cross safely. Can you live in Las Vegas and live in the suburbs of south Henderson? Probably not likely. Not everyone wants to live in an urban center. We like living in the suburbs and city folks are constantly trying to force us into living in the city like them. If you want to live in a high rise apartment then go for it, but not everyone wants that lifestyle. The whole idea of pushing mass transit is extremely ageist. Young people want it, but old people do not. 70 year old grannies don't want to ride on buses.
Streetcars with slot machines in them !
Why not do a loop, airport to downtown and down the strip back to the airport. Then another one going to allegiant then up the strip to downtown then airport.
lol I live in Vegas its so ass the strip should be a walkway only instead of jut a road its annoying but rapid transit for us who live in Summerlin and Henderson need a train or sum
as a vegas resident, it saddens me how bad public transportation is here when I visit other cities
So well thought out. This was so interesting
Borrowing an idea from Helsinki's tram system – selected trains could even have a bar car with some gaming machines.
"In a city where a lot of people are drinking, among doing other things…" LOL. Would be really cool to see something like what you laid out actually happen before living in the desert becomes too unsustainable.
To give you some back story on the monorail. It already existed, MGM had a monorail that ran between MGM and Bally's. They used old Disney monorails. The current monorail runs and was extended on that existing track. The problem is no one in LV is on the same page. For example, Venetian didn't want a station so it doesn't have one but the Hilton was all in and at the time had the Star Trek Experience so they made a futuristic style of station that was really cool. The Taxi unions didn't want an airport connector and as I mentioned earlier not every casino wants a station. There are little trams that run between casinos owned by the same companies. For example Luxor, Mandalay and Excalibur. There was one between Mirage and Treasure Island, don't know if that still operates. I honestly don't think that every casino operator is onboard with transit. What they did with the monorail is a mess, it doesn't go anywhere and someone that fly's in can't hop on it and go to a casino. They should have either connected it to the airport or just shuttered the program. I personally think the casinos don't want you to be able to move around, they want you to come in and stay. Because honestly speaking if LV wanted a transit system and everyone was onboard they'd have one. It doesn't make sense that you can build Paris, NY, Rome, and Venice in the desert but you can't build a train to the airport.
Very interesting series, and a banger of an opening episode. I'll be looking forward to more of this for sure.
Such pie in the sky stuff. There is too much public sentiment against mass transit in LV that all but the most practical (and inexpensive) options would even be considered. And the most practical solution would be a light rail tram system running curbside along LV Blvd. from downtown all the way to the airport. You mentioned being stuck in traffic, but so does being in an expensive car. And it would be highly used by pedestrians up and down the strip, which would end up increasing tourism. Put the stops right at the bottom of the pedestrian bridges.
So whatever the area ponies up for construction would be recaptured in the long run by tourist dollars. I also agree that this is the perfect type of system to have no fares to make it easy as possible for tourists to ride and lowest in cost for construction and operation.
This video needed to be made. Thank you 🙏🏾 .
Good luck on that should’ve done it 40 years ago just like they should have a morning and night train to and from LA.
💡
11:35 passing on the cost is a "bad move" bless your heart, but no business takes an expense without passing it on, either explicitly or implicitly.
I agree totally. Build a connection to the existing monorail to the airport. It can move hundreds of people per hour back and forth. Close off the las vegas blvd to cars and build a people mover from the Luxor to downtown Fremont st.
Melding the look of the train to that of some of the casinos would make the train ugly lol. See the Excalibur, Luxor, and the Circus Circus for some examples.
Great idea, until the Democrats that run Nevada decide to shut down the entire economy again for a year. Kind of defeats the purpose of investing in any public transit when that's the case.
The monorail is inconveniently located and ridiculously overpriced (even for Vegas). And that Tesla tunnel….🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
$7 billion?
You clearly don't know that casinos don't like to pick up the tab and gladly pass on the cost saying that they did pick up the tab or had to make internal accommodations
speaking of places that probably need a metro…. san antonio
Thinking about rapid transit with huge windows is a good call for Vegas. In Whistler there is the 'peak-to-peak' gondola which is nearly transit, almost, and basically serves only to give people amazing views. I can see people riding an elevated metro up and down the strip just as a fun way to see the sights. (As long as they don't limo tint the windows and make it super bright inside.)
I don't like it. I think a line from downtown straight down the strip to the bright line would be best. Then there can be a more direct short spur or a people mover from the airport to the strip. If you really want the university and convention center stops, then you could have a line that goes straight up from the airport to downtown. Then they could connect with the strip line and then diverge to connect to other parts of the city
You must not know about the mob called the Las Vegas Convention Bureau.
Your idea is interesting but I think some of the premises are flawed. 1. You can’t have free it doesn’t work for a number or reasons. 2. Please, please don’t have the casinos run anything. The big corporations here are not interested in what’s best for people it’s only their bottom line they are interested in. Have you seen some of the buildings they actually make money at and the condition they are in. Yeah I’m looking at you RIO and there are others.
Don't forget the underground tunnels being run by one of the worst human beings ever to walk this planet.
The high-speed rail system will never happen. That projects have been talked about for the last 20 YEARS.
I'm all for free transit. Tax the Cascino to pay for it.
As a 44 year resident of Las Vegas I can say your plan would never work and even if it did would take 20 years to build. Just look at how long the "Dropicana" project is supposed to take (it will take longer, I can guarantee) and that's basically just building an interchange and is planned to take until 2025.
I think you should mention the APM systems in Las Vegas. They are no RTS, but they are connection casinos and hotels. I think they are really great.
Why stop at free transit? Why not have all those casino workers in Vegas pay for visitor's airfare too!? That would make your metro system worth the 20-minute walk in the desert to get to it.
Step 1. Break the deal with Elon Musk, who has exclusivity in the Strip corridor for the next couple of decades. (He's made multople such deals across the country, which mostly serve to block transit development.)
Vegas is definitely one place with both the money and the need….
A hong Kong style double-decker tram on the Las Vegas Boulevard could be cool to have. It does not obstruct the view and provides a nice experience for the tourists.
Such a transit wasteland . Ps Interesting that no one has ever done a "London" casino there, complete with Tube service!
just for Las Vegas or also Paradise?
The thing is most of the city is not really in the city. I would think that this brings a problem to the financing of sensible projects.
I'm excited to see the Las Vegas Loop built out. Vegas had an opportunity to build a metro system under the Strip a few years back. They did a study and they finished without doing anything. The cost was going to be "Billions".
The LVCC Loop has been open (technically) a couple of years, and it has handled the traffic of CES admirably. It isn't a completely finished product, because the cars aren't yet automated, but the <10 second average wait time during CES is commendable.
One problem with your line along the Vegas Strip and another line from that one to the convention center is that you'll need a massive transfer station for passengers to wait to go from one train to the other. If the car tunnel won't handle the number of passengers you're expecting, then you'll need the room for them until their train arrives.
On the other hand, the cars won't need a transfer station, as they'll merge into the strip tunnel traffic and take their passengers to any hotel, the airport, or the stadium without stopping.
"That's not cars in a fun multi-coloured sewer sized tunnel" – Reece
I definitely agree Vegas should use an automated metro system, especially in and around the strip
I also feel a regional rail system should be used in the sprawling suburban areas
THANKS,,,,GOOD INFO
As a civil engineer, born and raised in Vegas, nothing would make me happier than being able to work on a project like this.
With close to 650,000 people in the city limits and over 2.3 million people in the Las Vegas Valley. Clark County being the 11th largest county in the United States, I’m surprised that Las Vegas hasn’t followed through with any form of light rail service.
light rail straight down the center of the strip….Done!!
I started going to Vegas around mid 2006. I always thought they'd come up with a better way to manage all of the traffic by now. The transit never seems to catch up with the new construction and attractions.