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101-627: Las Vegas Boulevard runs the length of the Las Vegas metropolitan area in Clark County. "The Boulevard", as it is sometimes called by longtime Las Vegas residents, starts at about 3.75-mile (6.04 km) southwest of the ghost town of Crystal , and continues south to about 2 mi (3.2 km) south of Jean , in the Mojave Desert . The Boulevard shows up again in Primm , but is currently not connected to

202-420: A "bust" (e.g., catastrophic resource price collapse). A gold rush often brought intensive but short-lived economic activity to a remote village, only to leave a ghost town once the resource was depleted. Boomtowns can often decrease in size as quickly as they grew. Sometimes, all, or nearly all, of the population can desert the town, resulting in a ghost town. The dismantling of a boomtown can often occur on

303-1002: A Schleswig-Holstein licence. AWPs are governed by federal law – the Trade Regulation Act and the Gaming Ordinance. The Casino Estoril , located in the municipality of Cascais , on the Portuguese Riviera , near Lisbon , is the largest casino in Europe by capacity. During the World War II , it was reputed to be a gathering point for spies , dispossessed royals , and wartime adventurers; it became an inspiration for Ian Fleming 's James Bond 007 novel Casino Royale . There are four legal gaming zones in Russia: "Siberian Coin" (Altay), "Yantarnaya" (Kaliningrad region), "Azov-city" (Rostov region) and "Primorie" (Primorie region). Singapore

404-542: A city street for locals and tourists. Its current name, in effect since 1959, reflects its importance to the Valley rather than past names when it served as a main intra-city road. On October 16, 2009, the Federal Highway Administration announced the designation of a new National Scenic Byway on the boulevard. The 3.5-mile (5.6 km) section starting at Sahara Avenue and running north to Washington Avenue

505-842: A ghost town because the economic activity that supported it (usually industrial or agricultural) has failed or ended for any reason (e.g. a host ore deposit exhausted by mining ). The town may have also declined because of natural or human-caused disasters such as floods , prolonged droughts, extreme heat or extreme cold, government actions, uncontrolled lawlessness, war, pollution, or nuclear and radiation-related accidents and incidents . The term can sometimes refer to cities, towns, and neighborhoods that, though still populated, are significantly less so than in past years; for example, those affected by high levels of unemployment and dereliction. Some ghost towns, especially those that preserve period-specific architecture, have become tourist attractions. Some examples are Bannack, Montana and Oatman, Arizona in

606-499: A one-room schoolhouse. Another example of infrastructure remaining is the former town of Weston, Illinois , that voted itself out of existence and turned the land over for construction of the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory . Many houses and even a few barns remain, used for housing visiting scientists and storing maintenance equipment, while roads that used to cross through the site have been blocked off at

707-537: A part in the abandonment of settlements within Europe. Two examples are Pripyat and Chernobyl . After the Chernobyl disaster of 1986, both cities were evacuated due to dangerous radiation levels within the area. As of today, Pripyat remains completely abandoned, and Chernobyl has around 500 remaining inhabitants. Another example is Todoque in the Canary Islands, Spain. During the 2021 Cumbre Vieja volcanic eruption ,

808-444: A planned basis. Mining companies nowadays will create a temporary company town to service a mine site, building all the accommodations, shops and services required, and then remove them once the resource has been extracted. Modular buildings can be used to facilitate the process. In some cases, multiple factors may remove the economic basis for a community; some former mining towns on U.S. Route 66 suffered both mine closures when

909-524: A pleasant albeit unidentifiable odor released by Las Vegas slot machines generated about 50% more in daily revenue. He suggested that the scent acted as an aphrodisiac, causing a more aggressive form of gambling. The following lists major casino markets in the world with casino revenue of over US$ 1 billion as published in PricewaterhouseCoopers 's report on the outlook for the global casino market: According to Bloomberg , accumulated revenue of

1010-448: A recent economic and holiday population surge. Another town, Sungai Lembing , Malaysia, was almost deserted due to closure of a tin mine in 1986 was revived in 2001 and has become a tourist destination since then. Foncebadón , a village in León , Spain, that was mostly abandoned and only inhabited by a mother and son, is slowly being revived owing to the ever-increasing stream of pilgrims on

1111-434: A result of a natural or human-made disaster or other causes; they restrict the term to settlements that were deserted because they were no longer economically viable. Some believe that any settlement with visible tangible remains should not be called a ghost town; others say, conversely, that a ghost town should contain the tangible remains of buildings. Whether or not the settlement must be completely deserted, or may contain

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1212-821: A rise in the number of casinos outside of Las Vegas and Atlantic City. In Vietnam , the term "casinos" encompasses gambling activities within the country . Unofficially defined, a "casino" typically denotes a well-established and professional gambling establishment that is generally lawful but exclusively caters to foreign players. On the other hand, "gambling houses" or "gambling dens" are smaller, illicit gambling venues. As of 2022, Vietnam has 9 operating casinos, including: Đồ Sơn casino (Hải Phòng), Lợi Lai casino, Hoàng Gia casino ( Quảng Ninh ), Hồng Vận casino ( Quảng Ninh ), Lào Cai casino ( Lào Cai ), Silver Shores casino (Đà Nẵng), Hồ Tràm casino (Bà Rịa – Vũng Tàu), Nam Hội An casino (Quảng Nam), Phú Quốc casino in Kien Giang . In

1313-422: A shift towards fly-in fly-out arrangements over building a company town , in order to avoid the development of ghost towns once a mining resource has been fully extracted. The Middle East has many ghost towns and ruins that were created when the shifting of politics or the fall of empires caused capital cities to be socially or economically unviable, such as Ctesiphon . The rise of real-estate speculation and

1414-420: A small population, is also a matter for debate. Generally, though, the term is used in a looser sense, encompassing any and all of these definitions. American author Lambert Florin defined a ghost town as "a shadowy semblance of a former self." Factors leading to the abandonment of towns include depleted natural resources, economic activity shifting elsewhere, railroads and roads bypassing or no longer accessing

1515-634: A string of ghost towns in areas such as the Solana Valley . Traditional agricultural practices such as sheep and goat rearing, on which the mountain village economy was based, were not taken over by the local youth, especially after the lifestyle changes that swept over rural Spain during the second half of the 20th century. Examples for ghost towns in Italy include the medieval village of Fabbriche di Careggine near Lago di Vagli , in province of Lucca , in Tuscany ,

1616-538: A survey conducted by the Vietnamese Institute for Sustainable Regional Development and released on September 30, 2015, it was found that 71% of the respondents held the belief that allowing Vietnamese individuals to access casinos would result in an increase in the number of players. Furthermore, 47.4% of the participants expressed the view that engaging in rewarding recreational activities has a positive impact on job opportunities for residents. Additionally, 46.2% of

1717-464: A town's life. In 1944, occupying German Waffen-SS troops murdered almost the entire population of the French village Oradour-sur-Glane . A new settlement was built nearby after the war, but the old town was left depopulated on the orders of President Charles de Gaulle , as a permanent memorial. In Germany, numerous smaller towns and villages in the former eastern territories were completely destroyed in

1818-518: Is an up-and-coming destination for visitors wanting to gamble, although there are currently only two casinos (both foreign owned), in Singapore. The Marina Bay Sands is the second most expensive standalone casino in the world, at a price of US$ 6.8 billion, and is among the world's ten most expensive buildings . With currently over 1,000 casinos, the United States has the largest number of casinos in

1919-546: Is based on real people and events; however, many of those events are contested by main character Semyon Dukach . Monte Carlo Casino has also been featured in multiple James Bond novels and films. The casino is mentioned in the song " The Man Who Broke the Bank at Monte Carlo " as well as the film of the same name . Casinò di Campione is located in the tiny Italian enclave of Campione d'Italia , within Ticino , Switzerland. The casino

2020-680: Is filled with stories of entertainment based on games of chance. The first known European gambling house, not called a casino although meeting the modern definition, was the Ridotto , established in Venice , Italy, in 1638 by the Great Council of Venice to provide controlled gambling during the carnival season. It was closed in 1774 as the city government felt it was impoverishing the local gentry . In American history, early gambling establishments were known as saloons . The creation and importance of saloons

2121-471: Is now home to more than four million people. Wars and rebellions in some African countries have left many towns and villages deserted. Since 2003, when President François Bozizé came to power, thousands of citizens of the Central African Republic have been forced to flee their homes as a result of the escalating conflict between armed rebels and government troops. Villages accused of supporting

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2222-485: Is usually divided between a physical security force and a specialized surveillance department. The physical security force usually patrols the casino and responds to calls for assistance and reports of suspicious or definite criminal activity. A specialized surveillance department operates the casino's closed-circuit-television system, known in the industry as the eye in the sky . Both of these specialized casino security departments work very closely with each other to ensure

2323-460: The Sperrgebiet ("forbidden zone"), effectively criminalizing new settlement. The small mining towns of this area, among them Pomona , Elizabeth Bay and Kolmanskop , were exempt from this ban, but the denial of new land claims soon rendered all of them ghost towns. The town of Dhanushkodi , India is a ghost town. It was destroyed during the 1964 Rameswaram cyclone and remains uninhabited in

2424-561: The American Mafia and in Macau by Triad syndicates . According to some police reports, local incidence of reported crime often doubles or triples within three years of a casino's opening. In a 2004 report by the US Department of Justice, researchers interviewed people who had been arrested in Las Vegas and Des Moines and found that the percentage of problem or pathological gamblers among

2525-464: The Chernobyl disaster of 1986, dangerously high levels of nuclear contamination escaped into the surrounding area, and nearly 200 towns and villages in Ukraine and neighbouring Belarus were evacuated, including the cities of Pripyat and Chernobyl . The area was so contaminated that many of the evacuees were never permitted to return to their homes. Pripyat is the most famous of these abandoned towns; it

2626-553: The Harry Reid International Airport property. The sign is often considered the south end of the Strip. "South Strip" is now used to describe the section of Las Vegas Boulevard between Russell Road and Blue Diamond Road. Along this stretch, development thins out, except for newer shopping malls , hotels , resorts , casinos and condominiums (such as South Point Hotel & Casino and The Grandview at Las Vegas ) as

2727-684: The Interstate highway system replaced the railroads as the favored means of transportation. Ghost towns are common in mining or mill towns in all the western states, and many eastern and southern states as well. Residents are compelled to leave in search of more productive areas when the resources that had created an employment boom in these towns were eventually exhausted. Sometimes a ghost town consists of many abandoned buildings as in Bodie, California , or standing ruins as in Rhyolite, Nevada , while elsewhere only

2828-598: The Massachusetts Institute of Technology , highlights the decision of the audio directors at Silicon Gaming to make its slot machines resonate in "the universally pleasant tone of C, sampling existing casino soundscapes to create a sound that would please but not clash". Alan Hirsch, founder of the Smell & Taste Treatment and Research Foundation in Chicago , studied the impact of certain scents on gamblers, discerning that

2929-581: The National Register of Historic Places . Starting in 2002, an attempt to declare an official ghost town in California stalled when the adherents of the town of Bodie and those of Calico , in Southern California , could not agree on the most deserving settlement for the recognition. A compromise was eventually reached—Bodie became the official state gold rush ghost town, while Calico was named

3030-773: The Old Las Vegas Mormon Fort State Historic Park , the Neon Museum , and the Fremont Street Experience and downtown casino sector. On crossing Washington Avenue, the Boulevard is designated as the Downtown Las Vegas Boulevard Scenic Byway by the state. This designation continues south to Sahara Avenue. Further south is a stretch of road that has many of the older motels , bars and wedding chapels that were among

3131-576: The Stanford Battle Area , were commandeered by the War Office for use as training grounds for British and US troops. Although this was intended to be a temporary measure, the residents were never allowed to return, and the villages have been used for military training ever since. Three miles or 5 km southeast of Imber is Copehill Down , a deserted village purpose-built for training in urban warfare . Disasters & natural disasters have played

Las Vegas Boulevard - Misplaced Pages Continue

3232-430: The Boulevard continues to travel south, just to the east of Interstate 15 . After passing the M Resort , the Boulevard enters rural desert areas. It continues to parallel Interstate 15 and eventually arrives at Jean . South of Jean, the road ceases to be a major artery for a stretch of several miles before resuming just north of Primm , where it runs alongside two of the resort's hotels and shopping mall; just short of

3333-574: The Las Vegas Strip) and State Route 6 (entire segment, unsigned ). South of the city, Las Vegas Boulevard was commonly known as the Los Angeles Highway . Just north of Jean is the place where the last spike on the San Pedro, Los Angeles, and Salt Lake Railroad line was driven. With the construction of I-15, Las Vegas Boulevard went from being the main through road to one that only served as

3434-638: The Nevada/California state line, the road changes its name to Lotto Store Road and becomes a local road. RTC Transit Route(s) 113 (and the MAX, before February 2016, when it was decommissioned) serves the road from Downtown Las Vegas north to Nellis Air Force Base, The Deuce serves the Road from Downtown Las Vegas south to Warm Springs and then to the South Strip Transfer Terminal (SSTT)). Route 117 serves

3535-456: The Strip technically ending at Russell Road . This is the section of the road most people are familiar with; it is home to casino megaresorts with their world-famous lights, huge video signs, and other attractions. It is designated as an All-American Road . Just past the end of "The Strip", the road passes the Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas sign (located in the median) as it abuts the western edge of

3636-818: The U.S. when NASA acquired land to construct the John C. Stennis Space Center (SSC), a rocket testing facility in Hancock County, Mississippi (on the Mississippi side of the Pearl River , which is the Mississippi – Louisiana state line). This required NASA to acquire a large (approximately 34-square-mile or 88-square-kilometre) buffer zone because of the loud noise and potential dangers associated with testing such rockets. Five thinly populated rural Mississippi communities (Gainesville, Logtown, Napoleon, Santa Rosa, and Westonia), plus

3737-627: The US the Newport Casino in Newport, Rhode Island . In modern-day Italian, a casino is a brothel (also called casa chiusa , literally "closed house"), a mess (confusing situation), or a noisy environment; a gaming house is spelt casinò , with an accent . Not all casinos are used for gaming. The Catalina Casino , on Santa Catalina Island, California , has never been used for traditional games of chance, which were already outlawed in California by

3838-435: The US's second largest gambling city. Most jurisdictions worldwide have a minimum gambling age of 18 to 21. Customers gamble by playing games of chance , in some cases with an element of skill, such as craps , roulette , baccarat , blackjack , and video poker . Most games have mathematically determined odds that ensure the house has at all times an advantage over the players. This can be expressed more precisely by

3939-453: The United States say that a player staking money won from the casino is "playing with the house's money". Video lottery machines ( slot machines ) have become one of the most popular forms of gambling in casinos. As of 2011 investigative reports have started calling into question whether the modern-day slot-machine is addictive. Factors influencing gambling tendencies include sound, odour and lighting. Natasha Dow Schüll, an anthropologist at

4040-545: The United States, and Canada, where housing is often used as an investment rather than for habitation. Railroads and roads bypassing or no longer reaching a town can also create a ghost town. This was the case in many of the ghost towns along Ontario's historic Opeongo Line , and along U.S. Route 66 after motorists bypassed the latter on the faster moving highways I-44 and I-40 . Some ghost towns were founded along railways where steam trains would stop at periodic intervals for repairs or to take on water. Amboy, California ,

4141-756: The United States; Barkerville, British Columbia in Canada; Craco and Pompeii in Italy; Aghdam in Azerbaijan; Kolmanskop in Namibia; Pripyat and Chernobyl in Ukraine; Dhanushkodi in India; Fordlândia in Brazil and Villa Epecuén in Argentina. T. Lindsey Baker, author of Ghost Towns of Texas , defines a ghost town as "a town for which the reason for being no longer exists." Some writers discount settlements that were abandoned as

Las Vegas Boulevard - Misplaced Pages Continue

4242-406: The aftermath. Many abandoned towns and settlements in the former Soviet Union were established near Gulag labour camps to supply necessary services. Since most of these camps were abandoned in the 1950s, the towns were abandoned as well. One such town is located near the former Gulag camp called Butugychag (also called Lower Butugychag). Other towns were deserted due to deindustrialisation and

4343-405: The arrestees was three to five times higher than in the general population. It has been said that economic studies showing a positive relationship between casinos and crime usually fail to consider the visiting population: they count crimes committed by visitors but do not count visitors in the population measure, which overstates the crime rate. Part of the reason this methodology is used, despite

4444-452: The biggest casino operator companies worldwide amounted to almost US$ 55 billion in 2011. SJM Holdings Ltd. was the leading company in this field, earning $ 9.7 bn in 2011, followed by Las Vegas Sands Corp. at $ 7.4 bn. The third-biggest casino operator company (based on revenue) was Caesars Entertainment , with revenue of US$ 6.2 bn. While there are casinos in many places, a few places have become well known specifically for gambling. Perhaps

4545-637: The cards they are holding in their hands visible at all times. Over the past few decades, casinos have developed many different marketing techniques for attracting and maintaining loyal patrons. Many casinos use a loyalty rewards program used to track players' spending habits and target their patrons more effectively, by sending mailings with free slot play and other promotions. Casino Helsinki in Helsinki , Finland, for example, donates all of its profits to charity. Casinos have been linked to organised crime , with early casinos in Las Vegas originally dominated by

4646-508: The country, were wiped out due to the Great Famine in the latter half of the 19th century, and the years of economic decline that followed. Catastrophic environmental damage caused by long-term contamination can also create a ghost town. Some notable examples are Times Beach, Missouri , whose residents were exposed to a high level of dioxins , and Wittenoom, Western Australia , which was once Australia's largest source of blue asbestos , but

4747-481: The deserted mountain village Craco located in Basilicata , which has served as a filming location, and the ghost village Roveraia, in the municipality of Loro Ciuffenna , in province of Arezzo , situated near Pratovalle . During World War II it was an important partisan base and it was definitively abandoned in the 1980s, when the last family who lived here, left the village. . Two projects have been proposed for

4848-725: The development of ghost towns. Tyneham , in Dorset , was requisitioned for military exercises during the Second World War , and remains unpopulated, being littered with unexploded munitions from regular shelling. A few ghost towns have managed to get a second life, and this happens through a variety of reasons. One of these reasons is heritage tourism generating a new economy able to support residents. For example, Walhalla, Victoria , Australia, became almost deserted after its gold mine ceased operation in 1914, but owing to its accessibility and proximity to other attractive locations, it has had

4949-409: The direction before the road name is common practice, The Boulevard is an exception, as it is rarely referred to as "North Las Vegas Boulevard" and "South Las Vegas Boulevard". The road instead is usually referred to as "Las Vegas Boulevard North" (abbreviated LVBN) and "Las Vegas Boulevard South" (stylized LVBS), by both residents and various media outlets. At its northern end, the Boulevard starts at

5050-624: The economic crises of the early 1990s attributed to post-Soviet conflicts – one example being Tkvarcheli in Georgia, a coal mining town that suffered a drastic population decline as a result of the War in Abkhazia in the early 1990s. Although in 2010s Chinese ghost cities became a frequent feature of discourse regarding China's economy and urbanization , under-occupied cities filled up. Writing in 2023, academic and former UK diplomat Kerry Brown described

5151-410: The edges of the property, with gatehouses or barricades to prevent unsupervised access. Construction of dams has produced ghost towns that have been left underwater. Examples include: Some towns become deserted when their populations were massacred , deported, or expelled. Examples include Kayaköy, an ancient Greek city abandoned in 1923 as result of population exchange between Greece and Turkey and

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5252-431: The entire population to flee. Upon seizing the city, Armenian forces destroyed much of the town to discourage Azerbaijanis from returning. More damage occurred in the following decades when locals looted the abandoned town for building materials. It is currently almost entirely ruined and uninhabited. Natural and human-made disasters can create ghost towns. For example, after being flooded more than 30 times since their town

5353-500: The foundations of former buildings remain as in Graysonia, Arkansas . Old mining camps that have lost most of their population at some stage of their history such as Aspen , Deadwood , Oatman , Tombstone and Virginia City are sometimes referred to as ghost towns although they are presently active towns and cities. Many U.S. ghost towns, such as South Pass City in Wyoming are listed on

5454-549: The high points of the old Vegas before the era of the megaresorts . The Boulevard leaves the city of Las Vegas at Sahara Avenue and assumes its unofficial name the Las Vegas Strip for the next 4 miles (6.4 km). This portion of Las Vegas Boulevard begins a few blocks to the north at the Stratosphere (the only major Strip hotel/casino sited within the Las Vegas city limits) and runs through Winchester and Paradise , with

5555-616: The historic casino located at the princely residence of Dragonara . Dragonara Palace was built in 1870. Its name comes from the Dragonara Point, the peninsula where it is built. On 15 July 1964, the palace opened as a casino. The former Portuguese colony of Macau , a special administrative region of the People's Republic of China since 1999, is a popular destination for visitors who wish to gamble. This started in Portuguese times, when Macau

5656-578: The idea of Chinese ghost cities as a popular bandwagon which was shown to be a myth. The town of Namie , along with several other towns in Fukushima Prefecture , Japan, was temporarily evacuated as a result of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster following the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami . Following ongoing decontamination works, several portions of Namie have been fully reopened to residents, allowing reconstruction and renovation of

5757-403: The imposition of taxes, or obtaining of other revenue. In 2007, the casino moved into new premises of more than 55,000 square metres (590,000 sq ft), making it the largest casino in Europe. The new casino was built alongside the old one, which dated from 1933 and has since been demolished. The archipelago of Malta is a particularly famous place for casinos, standing out mainly with

5858-438: The largest concentration of casinos in the United States. Based on revenue, Atlantic City, New Jersey , ranks second, and the Chicago region third. Top American casino markets by revenue (2022 annual revenues): The Nevada Gaming Control Board divides Clark County , which is coextensive with the Las Vegas metropolitan area, into seven market regions for reporting purposes. Native American gaming has been responsible for

5959-519: The last two years of the war. These territories later became part of Poland and the Soviet Union , and many of the smaller settlements were never rebuilt or repopulated, for example Kłomino ( Westfalenhof ), Pstrąże ( Pstransse ), and Janowa Góra ( Johannesberg ). Some villages in England were also abandoned during the war, but for different reasons. Imber , on Salisbury Plain , and several villages in

6060-601: The locality was severely affected. Hundreds of buildings were destroyed, including the parish Church of Saint Pius X, the health center, the headquarters of the neighborhood association, the School of Early Childhood Education, and Los Campitos Elementary School and the Todoque Elementary and the Infant Education School, and by October 10, new lava flows destroyed the remaining buildings that were still standing, leaving

6161-471: The most notable are Anyox , Kitsault , and Ocean Falls . Some ghost towns have revived their economies and populations due to historical and eco-tourism, such as Barkerville ; once the largest town north of Kamloops , it is now a year-round provincial museum. In Quebec, Val-Jalbert is a well-known tourist ghost town; founded in 1901 around a mechanical pulp mill that became obsolete when paper mills began to break down wood fibre by chemical means, it

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6262-514: The nation's second-largest city with 1 million people, was a village of only a few thousand people before colonization. Alexandria , the second-largest city of Egypt, was a flourishing city in the Ancient era, but declined during the Middle Ages. It underwent a dramatic revival during the 19th century; from a population of 5,000 in 1806, it grew into a city of more than 200,000 inhabitants by 1882, and

6363-464: The northern portion of a sixth ( Pearlington ), along with 700 families in residence, had to be completely relocated away from the facility. Sometimes the town might cease to officially exist, but the physical infrastructure remains. For example, the five Mississippi communities that had to be abandoned to build SSC still have remnants of those communities within the facility itself. These include city streets, now overgrown with forest flora and fauna, and

6464-438: The northern sections. There are tentative plans to connect the existing section at Primm to the northern section at Jean. Las Vegas Boulevard serves as the Valley's east/west address demarcation boundary line south of the Strat onwards. The road's own north/south street address demarcation boundary is located at its intersection with Fremont Street. Unlike most other cases, where using the more traditional nomenclature of putting

6565-405: The notion of expected value , which is uniformly negative (from the player's perspective). This advantage is called the house edge . In games such as poker where players play against each other, the house takes a commission called the rake . Casinos sometimes give out complimentary items or comps to gamblers. Payout is the percentage of funds ("winnings") returned to players. Casinos in

6666-409: The official state silver rush ghost town. Casino A casino is a facility for certain types of gambling . Casinos are often built near or combined with hotels , resorts , restaurants , retail shops , cruise ships , and other tourist attractions. Some casinos are also known for hosting live entertainment, such as stand-up comedy, concerts, and sports. Casino is of Italian origin;

6767-454: The original French village at Oradour-sur-Glane which was destroyed on 10 June 1944 when 642 of its 663 inhabitants were killed by a German Waffen-SS company. A new village was built after the war on a nearby site, and the ruins of the original have been maintained as a memorial. Another example is Aghdam , a city in Azerbaijan . Armenian forces occupied Aghdam in July 1993 during the First Nagorno-Karabakh War . The heavy fighting forced

6868-450: The overstatement, is that reliable data on tourist count are often not available. Casinos are subject to specific regulations for worker safety, as casino employees are both at greater risk for cancers resulting from exposure to second-hand tobacco smoke and musculoskeletal injuries from repetitive motions while running table games over many hours. These are not the extent of the hazards casino workers may be exposed to, but every location

6969-425: The place almost defined by its casino is Monte Carlo, but other places are known as gambling centers. Monte Carlo Casino , located in Monte Carlo city, in Monaco , is a casino and a tourist attraction. Monte Carlo Casino has been depicted in many books, including Ben Mezrich 's Busting Vegas , where a group of Massachusetts Institute of Technology students beat the casino out of nearly $ 1 million. This book

7070-463: The reason for abandonment can arise from a town's intended economic function shifting to another, nearby place. This happened to Collingwood, Queensland , in Outback Australia when nearby Winton outperformed Collingwood as a regional centre for the livestock-raising industry. The railway reached Winton in 1899, linking it with the rest of Queensland , and Collingwood was a ghost town by the following year. More broadly across Australia, there has been

7171-467: The reason for their complete abandonment. Examples are Marinka and Soledar in Donbas in Ukraine . Canada has several ghost towns in parts of British Columbia , Alberta , Ontario , Saskatchewan , Newfoundland and Labrador , and Quebec . Some were logging towns or dual mining and logging sites, often developed at the behest of the company . In Alberta and Saskatchewan, most ghost towns were once farming communities that have since died off due to

7272-552: The rebels, such as Beogombo Deux near Paoua , are ransacked by government soldiers. Those who are not killed have no choice but to escape to refugee camps. The instability in the region also leaves organized and well-equipped bandits free to terrorize the populace, often leaving villages abandoned in their wake. Elsewhere in Africa, the town of Lukangol was burnt to the ground during tribal clashes in South Sudan . Before its destruction,

7373-756: The recovery of the village: in 2011 the proposal of Movimento Libero Perseo "Roveraia eco - lab", based on sustainability, and in 2019 there was a proposal aiming to recover the village with a mix of functions called "Ecomuseum of Pratomagno". In the United Kingdom, thousands of villages were abandoned during the Middle Ages, as a result of Black Death , revolts, and enclosure , the process by which vast amounts of farmland became privately owned. Since there are rarely any visible remains of these settlements, they are not generally considered ghost towns; instead, they are referred to in archaeological circles as deserted medieval villages . Sometimes, wars and genocide end

7474-536: The removal of the railway through the town or the bypass of a highway. The ghost towns in British Columbia were predominantly mining towns and prospecting camps as well as canneries and, in one or two cases, large smelter and pulp mill towns. British Columbia has more ghost towns than any other jurisdiction on the North American continent, with more than 1,500 abandoned or semi-abandoned towns and localities. Among

7575-502: The resources were depleted and loss of highway traffic as US 66 was diverted from places like Oatman, Arizona , onto a more direct path. Mine and pulp mill closures have led to many ghost towns in British Columbia, Canada, including several relatively recent ones: Ocean Falls , which closed in 1973 after the pulp mill was decommissioned; Kitsault , whose molybdenum mine shut down after only 18 months in 1982; and Cassiar , whose asbestos mine operated from 1952 to 1992. In other cases,

7676-420: The respondents believed that such activities contribute positively to Vietnam's ability to attract investments. Given the large amounts of currency handled within a casino, both patrons and staff may be tempted to cheat and steal, in collusion or independently; most casinos have security measures to prevent this. Security cameras located throughout the casino are the most basic measure. Modern casino security

7777-458: The resulting possibility of real-estate bubbles (sometimes due to outright overbuilding by land developers) may also trigger the appearance of certain elements of a ghost town, as real-estate prices initially rise (whereupon affordable housing becomes less available) and then later fall for a variety of reasons that are often tied to economic cycles and/or marketing hubris. This has been observed to occur in various countries, including Spain, China,

7878-442: The road enters the city of North Las Vegas , it passes through some of the older commercial areas in the region. As the road approaches the city of Las Vegas proper, some of what historical Las Vegas became visible, as some of the older casinos appear along with some of the more famous and long-operating strip clubs . Upon entering the city limits of Las Vegas, the Boulevard showcases the area's past with many museums , including

7979-822: The road south from the SSTT past the Las Vegas Premium Outlet South store, the South Point Casino and Silverado Ranch Blvd. Las Vegas Boulevard has had several names, including 5th Street (from Sahara to Owens, within the Las Vegas city limits), Main Street (in North Las Vegas), the Arrowhead Highway , Los Angeles Highway, Salt Lake Highway, US 91 (entire segment), US 93 (from Fremont Street north), US 466 (from Jean to Fremont Street, including

8080-639: The road to Santiago de Compostela . Some ghost towns (e.g. Riace , Muñotello ) are being repopulated by respectively refugees and homeless people . In Riace, this was accomplished by a scheme funded by the Italian government which offers the housing to refugees and in Muñotello it was accomplished through an NGO ( Madrina Foundation ). In Algeria, many cities became hamlets after the end of Late Antiquity . They were revived with shifts in population during and after French colonization of Algeria . Oran , currently

8181-492: The root casa means a house. The term casino may mean a small country villa , summerhouse , or social club . During the 19th century, casino came to include other public buildings where pleasurable activities took place; such edifices were usually built on the grounds of a larger Italian villa or palazzo , and were used to host civic town functions, including dancing, gambling, music listening, and sports. Examples in Italy include Villa Farnese and Villa Giulia , and in

8282-596: The safety of both guests and the casino's assets, and have been quite successful in preventing crime. Some casinos also have catwalks in the ceiling above the casino floor, which allow surveillance personnel to look directly down, through one way glass, on the activities at the tables and slot machines. When it opened in 1989, The Mirage was the first casino to use cameras full-time on all table games. In addition to cameras and other technological measures, casinos also enforce security through rules of conduct and behavior; for example, players at card games are required to keep

8383-580: The south end of Moapa Paulite Solar Road. Running north of, but roughly parallel with I-15, it heads southwest toward Las Vegas, passing through an industrial complex of manufacturing plants and power plants running along the Union Pacific Railroad line in Apex . Traveling south, the road meets Nellis Air Force Base on the east side and the Las Vegas Motor Speedway on the west side. As

8484-563: The time it was built. The Copenhagen Casino was a Danish theatre which also held public meetings during the 1848 Revolution , which made Denmark a constitutional monarchy . In military and non-military usage, a casino (Spanish) or Kasino (German) is an officers' mess . The precise origin of gambling is unknown. It is generally believed that gambling in some form or another has been seen in almost every society in history. From Ancient Mesopotamia , Greeks and Romans to Napoleon's France and Elizabethan England , much of history

8585-563: The town had a population of 20,000. The Libyan town of Tawergha had a population of around 25,000 before it was abandoned during the 2011 civil war , and it has remained empty since. Many of the ghost towns in mineral-rich Africa are former mining towns. Shortly after the start of the 1908 diamond rush in German South-West Africa , now known as Namibia , the German Imperial government claimed sole mining rights by creating

8686-535: The town practically erased from the map. An example in the UK of a ghost village which was abandoned before it was ever occupied is at Polphail , Argyll and Bute . The planned development of an oil rig construction facility nearby never materialised, and a village built to house the workers and their families became deserted the moment the building contractors finished their work. War activities, displacements and complete destruction of cities as result of intense fighting were

8787-553: The town's buildings to be undertaken and resettlement of the area to take place. Urbanization – the migration of a country's rural population into the cities – has left many European towns and villages deserted. An increasing number of settlements in Bulgaria are becoming ghost towns for this reason; at the time of the 2011 census, the country had 181 uninhabited settlements. In Hungary, dozens of villages are also threatened with abandonment. The first village officially declared as "dead"

8888-406: The town, human intervention, disasters, massacres, wars, the shifting of politics or fall of empires, and volcanic eruptions. A town can also be abandoned when it is part of an exclusion zone due to natural or human-made causes . Ghost towns may result when the single activity or resource that created a boomtown (e.g., nearby mine, mill or resort) is depleted or the resource economy undergoes

8989-443: The world. The number continues to grow steadily as more states seek to legalize casinos. 40 states now have some form of casino gambling. Interstate competition, such as gaining tourism, has been a driving factor to continuous legalization. Relatively small places such as Las Vegas are best known for gambling; larger cities such as Chicago are not defined by their casinos in spite of the large turnover. The Las Vegas Valley has

9090-455: Was Gyűrűfű  [ hu ] in the late 1970s, but later it was repopulated as an eco-village . Some other depopulated villages were successfully saved as small rural resorts, such as Kán , Tornakápolna , Szanticska , Gorica , and Révfalu . In Spain, large zones of the mountainous Iberian System and the Pyrenees have undergone heavy depopulation since the early 20th century, leaving

9191-482: Was abandoned due to an uncontainable mine fire , which began in 1962 and still rages to this day; eventually the fire reached an abandoned mine underneath the nearby town of Byrnesville , which caused that mine to catch on fire too and forced the evacuation of that town as well. Ghost towns may also occasionally come into being due to an anticipated natural disaster – for example, the Canadian town of Lemieux, Ontario ,

9292-582: Was abandoned in 1991 after soil testing revealed that the community was built on an unstable bed of Leda clay . Two years after the last building in Lemieux was demolished, a landslide swept part of the former town-site into the South Nation River . Two decades earlier, the Canadian town of Saint-Jean-Vianney , Québec, also constructed on a Leda clay base, had been abandoned after a landslide on 4 May 1971, which swept away 41 homes, killing 31 people. Following

9393-518: Was abandoned when the mill closed in 1927 and re-opened as a park in 1960. Many ghost towns or abandoned communities exist in the American Great Plains , the rural areas of which have lost a third of their population since 1920. Thousands of communities in the northern plains states of Montana , Nebraska , North Dakota , and South Dakota became railroad ghost towns when a rail line failed to materialize. Hundreds of towns were abandoned as

9494-573: Was built for the workers of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant and had a population of almost 50,000 at the time of the disaster. Significant fatality rates from epidemics have produced ghost towns. Some places in eastern Arkansas were abandoned after more than 7,000 Arkansans died during the Spanish flu epidemic of 1918 and 1919. Several communities in Ireland, particularly in the west of

9595-453: Was designated the City of Las Vegas, Las Vegas Boulevard State Scenic Byway . [REDACTED] Media related to Las Vegas Boulevard at Wikimedia Commons Ghost town A ghost town , deserted city , extinct town , or abandoned city is an abandoned settlement, usually one that contains substantial visible remaining buildings and infrastructure such as roads. A town often becomes

9696-579: Was founded in 1845, residents of Pattonsburg, Missouri , decided to relocate after two floods in 1993. With government help, the whole town was rebuilt 3 miles or 5 km away. Craco , a medieval village in the Italian region of Basilicata , was evacuated after a landslide in 1963. Nowadays it is a filming location for many movies, including The Passion of The Christ by Mel Gibson , Christ Stopped at Eboli by Francesco Rosi , The Nativity Story by Catherine Hardwicke and Quantum of Solace by Marc Forster . In 1984, Centralia, Pennsylvania ,

9797-457: Was founded in 1917 as a site to gather information from foreign diplomats during the First World War. Today it is owned by the Italian government, and operated by the municipality. With gambling laws being less strict than in Italy and Switzerland, it is among the most popular gambling destination besides Monte Carlo. The income from the casino is sufficient for the operation of Campione without

9898-534: Was greatly influenced by four major cities: New Orleans , St. Louis , Chicago and San Francisco . It was in the saloons that travelers could find people to talk to, drink with, and often gamble with. During the early 20th century in the US, gambling was outlawed by state legislation. However, in 1931, gambling was legalized throughout the state of Nevada , where the US's first legalized casinos were set up. In 1976 New Jersey allowed gambling in Atlantic City , now

9999-612: Was part of one such series of villages along the Atlantic and Pacific Railroad across the Mojave Desert . River re-routing is another factor, one example being the towns along the Aral Sea . Ghost towns may be created when land is expropriated by a government, and residents are required to relocate. One example is the village of Tyneham in Dorset, England, acquired during World War II to build an artillery range. A similar situation occurred in

10100-443: Was popular with visitors from nearby Hong Kong , where gambling was more closely regulated. The Venetian Macao is currently the largest casino in the world. Macau also surpassed Las Vegas as the largest gambling market in the world. Machine-based gaming is only permitted in land-based casinos, restaurants, bars and gaming halls, and only subject to a licence. Online slots are, at the moment, only permitted if they are operated under

10201-557: Was shut down in 1966 due to health concerns. Treece and Picher , twin communities straddling the Kansas – Oklahoma border, were once one of the United States' largest sources of zinc and lead , but over a century of unregulated disposal of mine tailings led to groundwater contamination and lead poisoning in the town's children, eventually resulting in a mandatory Environmental Protection Agency buyout and evacuation. Contamination due to ammunition caused by military use may also lead to

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