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Atlantic City is a Highway in the Interstate World of Gambling
ATLANTIC CITY, NEW JERSEY --
Atlantic City casino management is getting creative in its latest wave of excuses for the fading business at gambling resorts in the town. But the city has seen what is coming before in the past, and old-time residents remember well enough to recognize the signs.
Casino executives have used the recession, competition from neighboring racinos, and smoking bans as reasons for declines in revenue. The latest fall guy is the city's underused airport, which has only Spirit Airlines as a regular carrier. Managers of empty resorts say customers might flock if more airlines visited the town.
But the transition has begun, as glory leaves the city once again. Many years ago, the boardwalk packed with tourists every summer. But US tastes changed, and Atlantic City fell into disrepair. Septuagenarian and lifelong Atlantic City resident Howard Ruling says, "It feels here just like when the beach stopped bring people. The casinos are as dead as the baoardwalk, they just don't know it yet."
Just like highway roadstops that wither once Interstates pass them by, the Atlantic City casinos are faced with the disappearance of their lifeblood, the day traveling gambler. Efforts to reposition the area as a destination have only made comparisons to Las Vegas and Biloxi more daunting.
As horse racing has had to accept its surrendering of the gambling limelight, hoping only to survive, so must Atlantic City realize its biggest years are behind it, and remodel itself on a smaller, more economical, memory of what it was.
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