$8.5b CityCenter complex opens in Las Vegas

Las Vegas: Casino executives prepared to open the newest and most expensive joint on the Las Vegas Strip on Wednesday night - a 4,000 room resort at the heart of the $8.5 billion CityCenter complex.

The 61-story Aria Resort & Casino was to be publicly unveiled with fireworks and fanfare, fitting for the heart of a project that has taken center stage in the struggling casino industry.

"This is really 21st century Las Vegas," said architect Cesar Pelli, whose team designed Aria. "This is really setting up very high standards that will be very hard to match - but I hope they will try."

CityCenter owners MGM Mirage and Dubai World thanked the architects, the employees and each other at a morning ceremony at the resort's main valet, several hours before an evening gala and Aria's public opening before midnight.

MGM Mirage and Dubai World executives also planned to remotely ring the closing bell of the New York Stock Exchange.

MGM Mirage CEO Jim Murren said that as CityCenter begins operating, it's now up to its 12,000 employees to deliver an entertaining, exciting environment that makes guest want to keep coming back.

"This is nothing if not for the people that work here," Murren said.

Murren earlier told employees in an e-mail that the opening of Aria, which contains CityCenter's only casino, will let tourists experience the development as it was envisioned, instead of in bits and pieces. Other parts of the 67-acre development opened earlier this month.

"This isn't just another opening," Murren said. "This is a game-changer."

Once Aria opens, its rooms, along with those at CityCenter's Mandarin Oriental and Vdara hotels, will increase room capacity on the Las Vegas Strip by 8.5 percent, UBS Investment Research analyst Robin Farley said.

That increase has competitors worried, as visitation to Las Vegas has decreased in the past two years as consumers spent less time and money traveling and gambling.

On Tuesday, a representative of the venerable Sahara hotel-casino less than three miles from CityCenter said it would shutter two of its towers until demand improves. A day earlier, Binion's Gambling Hall & Hotel in downtown Las Vegas closed its 365 guest rooms and cut 100 jobs to cut costs.

Competitors worry that CityCenter brings immediate pressure to lower room rates to keep hotels filled. But Murren and other MGM Mirage officials predict CityCenter will help Las Vegas as a whole, spurring visitation and bringing a catalyst for long-term prosperity.

MGM Mirage owns the most casinos on the Strip, but Murren told employees that CityCenter will help, not hurt, the company's other resorts.