[MUSIC PLAYING] Here's an idea. In Las Vegas, we're are
the America's ruins. So when most people
think of Las Vegas, they think of this--
gambling, drinking, all kinds of crazy revelry,
nonstop glitz, glamour, entertainment, and
showmanship happening inside and around these
massive, palatial casinos. Vegas's sobriquet is Sin City,
a place where one has access to any and every vice, assuming
one is able to pay the price. And these buildings structure
literally the whole experience. But this is also Las Vegas. It's just people don't normally
think about this part of it. Nevada was hit hard by the
subprime mortgage crisis, where banks gave mortgages to people
who technically couldn't afford them, and then repackaged those
mortgages as sound investments which eventually defaulted,
leaving people with homes they couldn't afford,
investors with empty pockets, and gaping money
holes in many markets. As of late October,
2015, Nevada has the highest home
foreclosure rate of any state in the country. And metropolitan
Las Vegas typically ranks within the top five. For a city that we associate
so strongly with opulence, there is a fair amount of
hardship here, and not just here but also here. The casinos, Vegas' monuments
to diversion, excess, and abundance, but also provider
of no shortage of employment opportunities for
locals, also suffered in the wake of the
recent economic collapse. This is Echelon Place which
began construction in 2007 and was slated to
be finished by 2010. It was to be an 87 acre
project with 5,300 hotel rooms across four hotels. And it had a construction
budget of $4 billion. In 2008, construction
stopped, first for a year, then another estimated
three to five years. So it sits here,
waiting, now more of a memorial than a monument. Echelon Place isn't
alone, either. In the last decade,
there has been 10 hotels that have been
abandoned or demolished. There are nearly a
dozen massive projects which started construction
but never finished. That Vegas is pocked with all
of these foreclosed upon homes and incomplete
monoliths is a testament to both it and America's
relationship to chance and chance's
relationship to wealth. Let's do some history. Long before The Strip,
downtown Las Vegas got its start as a playground
for construction workers building the Hoover Dam. At the time, Vegas
was the closest significantly sized
city with businesses that would stay open late. The state had legalized
gambling in 1931, the year that the dam
started construction. But the US government wasn't
too keen on that move. They didn't want their
federally-paid dam workers spending their hard-earned
dam cash on games of chance. So they schemed to
keep the workers away. But of course, their scheming
had the opposite effect. Dam workers flooded
Vegas-- pun intended-- and made it rave-- pun and
mixed metaphor intended. [MUSIC PLAYING] In 1936, when construction
of the dam completed, the Great Depression
was still in full swing, so all of those labors went
elsewhere to find work. Vegas needed to figure
out a way to survive, and quick, because it had
learned to depend on that dam cash, which had vamoosed. Luckily, though
the dam had stopped powering Vegas financially,
it could now power Vegas literally. And building upon their
long-held reputation as a playground
city, Vegas began outfitting its downtown, Fremont
Street, with bright lights a-go-go. After not long,
this part of town became known as Glitter Gulch. The rest is roughly and
literally speaking, history. Vegas learned to
depend on tourism fueled by glitz, glamour, and
nearby scenic attractions. Gangsters and real
estate developers learned to depend on Vegas's
lax law enforcement, regulation, and tax code. Entertainers from nearby LA,
and eventually across the world, learned in Vegas, there
is always an audience. By the late '40s, Vegas
had stepped into its own as America's
playground, initiating its modern reputation as
the perfect expression of American
exceptionalism by way of a particular brand of
flashy, capital-fueled, American excess, which works like
gangbusters until 2007, when the boom became
more of a dull thud. In the midst of a global
economic recession, the glitz of Sin City
can seem excessive at best or
irresponsible at worst, which means that tourists are
less likely to come visit. Add to that the fact that the
city's banks handed out some 35,000 loans that people
technically couldn't afford . I mean, I suppose in a city
that's defined by betting, it would make sense that real
estate developers and lending organizations would bet it all. On the one hand,
with civilian homes, it may be simple
predatory lending. But on the other
hand, with things like casinos and resorts, I
think it's something else. The Vegas most of us
recognize was constructed not to be used like a normal
city, like a New York, or a Paris, or a Tokyo,
to be marveled at. The Vegas we know is
for gawking, not living. The Bellagio, Luxor, the Hard
Rock Cafe, and their ilk all comprised a pseudo
city which isn't for residents,
but for people who have come to play in as many
senses of the word as possible. These structures are for
residing, but relaxing. And architecturally, this
is all almost literally America's playground
in that we've perhaps outgrown it and abandoned it,
except at great literal cost. Vegas is thoroughfares and
signage, towering obelisks, and countless
simulacra-- a pyramid, but not the city, but not
Europe, but not bodies of water, but not-- were
not built to age gracefully, but to impress
immediately and then be demolished or abandoned. On one block between
Sands Avenue and Flamingo Road used to sit Sands,
Castaways, Nob Hill, Holiday Casino and Inn, the
Imperial Palace, O'Sheas, and the Barbary Coast. Now, it's home to Treasure
Island, The Palazzo, The Venetian, The
Mirage, Casino Royale, Harrah's, The LINQ,
Caesar's Palace, Flamingo and the Cromwell. Not one original building
remains standing. In their influential book,
"Learning from Las Vegas," architect Robert Venturi,
Denise Brown, and Robert Izenour write that in this
landscape, architecture becomes symbol in space,
rather than form in space. Weirdly, they
weren't writing about this Las Vegas or this
Las Vegas, but this Vegas. They compare the parking
lots of Las Vegas to France's Versailles, a
massive, sprawling palace famous for its
gardens that stands as a symbol of the wealth
of the old ruling class, but also the absolute
monarchy of the old regime before the French Revolution. The parking lot, they write,
is the parterre of the asphalt landscape, beautiful for
all of its uselessness, a status symbol for storing
other status symbols. What then of those massive,
sprawling, finished, and unfinished mega casinos? What symbol are they? I might say, our ruins. Given the turnover of the
strip, destruction and ruination is practically
pre-built into them. Some of them become
alike to ruins before they're even finished. Sure, technically
speaking, ruins are structures
which at one point were complete and
have become decrepit over a long period of
time, though haven't turned entirely back into dust. Machu Picchu, the pyramids,
Petra, Teotihuacan, Angkor Wat, the Parthenon, the
Acropolis, Caesar's Palace-- there's this idea that
the strength of a society is confidently
communicated by the quality and resilience of its ruins. A powerful culture will build
a long-lasting structures. In short, America has all
kinds of impressive structures which will look great in the
post-apocalypse, while it seems a Vegas casino is unlikely
to make it half a generation, let alone some millennia. [MUSIC - "VIVA LAS VEGAS"] strip in Las Vegas,
as a location, is such a perfect distillation
of that stereotypical American abundance that it feels
like maybe this should be our Carthage or Roman
Forum, even if it won't be. These structures stand
already fulfilling their role as a ruins, though of
course, technically, they aren't testaments to the things
that are important to us, but also what isn't at a time
where the future of the United States' longstanding cultural
and economic authority is anything but certain. Though these things
may not be ruins then, perhaps it's meaningful for us
to look at them as ruins now. What do you guys think? Are the ruins of Vegas
something like Carthage after the fall of Rome? Let us know in the comments and
our response to some of them in next week's comment
response video. In this week's comment
response video, we talk about your thoughts
regarding listicles. If you want to watch that
one, you can click right here or find a link in
the doobly-doo. Thank you so much
to everyone who wrote a short story to enter in
to win an Idea Channel t-shirt. We had an awesome time
combing through them, randomly selecting three
winners, which we have. The winners are Papa Bad
Dad, Observer of Worlds, and Chemical Word Smith. So we're going to be sending
you guys a message via YouTube to get your information
to send you a t-shirt. We are, however, going to also
postpone the dramatic reading, because I caught a cold. And I don't want my
cold memorialized for all eternity having to read
your beautiful short stories with a nasaly voice. So maybe that'll
happen like next week. But I promise, it will. This week's episode
was brought to you by the hard work of
these high rollers. We have a Facebook, an
IRC, and a subreddit links in the doobly-doo. And the tweet of the week
comes from Leif Nelson, who points us towards a post
about the "Wizard of Oz," which has been re-cut
alphabetically, which means that every scene that
begins with a word that starts with the letter A is first. And it works its way all
the way through scenes that begin with the word zipper. And it appears that there is
more than one kind of movie that has been re-cut this way. I know what I'm doing this
afternoon, while also drinking tea. [MUSIC PLAYING]
A little surprised there wasn't one reference to Fallout: New Vegas.
Las Vegas has always been weird to me. It's like disney world. In its own little bubble.
I think we might be attracted to the ruins of Las Vegas because Las Vegas represents America's id and all that is attached to it. No other place says, "fuck it, do what you desire" as much as Las Vegas, and there is an odd fun playing in the ruins of dreams.
Great video! As a former Vegas Resident, I can verify that you got basically everything right. You captured the unique, glitzy, transient culture of Vegas, its history, the poverty that abounds outside of the Strip, and its symbolic place as the ruins of America. I recall walking by the Sahara (one of the closed casinos), seeing the old NASCAR Cafe, the roller coaster looping around the front of the building, and the poster for the "Big Badass Burrito Challenge," as seen on Man Vs. Food. It will no doubt soon be demolished (if it hasn't been already) and will be nothing more than a memory. However, I have to correct you on one thing; the Hoover Dam does not power Las Vegas. I have actually taken a tour of the Hoover Dam, been into its caves, and seen one of the two generator rooms. The tour guide said that the majority of the power generated at the Hoover Dam goes to California, with part of it going to Disneyland. Las Vegas is mostly just hooked up to the national grid. This is just a minor detail in an otherwise excellent video, keep up the good work!
Heh. Was that a subtle Percy Jackson reference there? https://youtu.be/MySO7UBTlbI?t=3m
While discussing the Hoover Dam: "They didn't want their federally-paid dam workers spending their hard-earned dam cash on games of chance." ;-) http://fangirlingoverdemigods.tumblr.com/post/87228126536/art-incredibru
I think there are some interesting parallels between Las Vegas and Detroit that could also be explored. Both cities largely came out of existence based around a single industry, both have been epicenters of middle-American culture, both were at their "height" in the middle 20th century, and both have faced dire situations in the face of major economic changes. While the struggles of Detroit finally came to a head over nearly four decades of turmoil, Las Vegas' seemed to happen overnight. But, its the same kind of attitude that built both cities that will (probably - hopefully) fix both in the long-run.
Kudos to you for pronouncing Teotihuacán properly.
ruins in other places tend to serve as connections to history, to stand in places you knew others once stood, to experience a, worn and changed, but still original part of a world that has passed. A place to reflect and learn about civilizations past, either dead or changes since the ruins were made. For most American people then, your ruins are found in Britain and Europe, since your cultural heritage is here, or your ruins are the structures built by Native Americans, since they are the people who stood where you stand now. Places where people never lived or lay dead aren't true ruins, and by using them to emulate a history and culture which they don't really tie in to you're doing the same as a lot of other parts of las vegas.
Las Vegas is going to be completely deserted when the water runs out. Not "if" but "when" - there is currently more water being taken out of the Colorado River than is going in and that's where Las Vegas gets most of its water. At the rate the water is disappearing, Las Vegas will be a true ghost town within a few decades. It's only a matter of time until the entire city is a ruin slowly being swallowed by the desert. The only people that will likely be left will be the few government workers that have to remain for their jobs up at Area 51.