Thursday, July 15, 2004
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

LAS VEGAS MONORAIL: Launch is hailed

Rail line overcomes delays, skeptics to serve seven stations beginning today

The Las Vegas Monorail approaches the MGM Grand station for a ceremonial first ride Wednesday morning. The system opens to the public today. Photo by Clint Karlsen. Passengers hold onto an overhead rail while riding the Las Vegas Monorail. About 50,000 people are expected to ride the monorail each day. Photo by Clint Karlsen. Click image for enlargement. Graphic by Mike Johnson.

After years of anticipation, months of delays and a day of celebrations, the ballyhooed Las Vegas Monorail this morning will begin hauling paying passengers on a route behind the Strip.

The $650 million line, which debuts to the public at 8 a.m., will be unique in ways beyond its basic premise of luring walkers off the car-crazy Strip and onto trains.

Innovations include driverless trains, taxpayer-free system funding and turning the simple act of riding a train into something called "transportainment."

But before carrying its first tourist behind the east side of Las Vegas Boulevard South, the monorail had to overcome a daunting price tag, skepticism and technical glitches that pushed back its rollout date.

"It's been a roller-coaster ride," said John Haycock, board chairman of the Las Vegas Monorail Co. "You can well imagine that on a project of this magnitude, every day there was a new obstacle to deal with."

The monorail made its ceremonial first passenger run Wednesday morning, plowing past a wind-scattered cosmetic cloud of fog and a blast of streamers.

VIPs along for the first ride included Gov. Kenny Guinn, Regional Transportation Commission Chairman Bruce Woodbury, entertainers Rita Rudner and Penn Jillette, and the usual Vegas big event gaggle of showgirls and sirens, who were whisked from the MGM Grand station to the Sahara stop in about 17 minutes.

In the evening, monorail backers hosted a soiree at the Las Vegas Hilton, where more than 1,000 invitees were expected, consisting mostly of transportation commission and monorail company officials, monorail employees and their families.

The evening event included a debut ride, fireworks at the system's various stations, a light show and a helicopter flyover. Later, guests were allowed to ride the train to the different stations, each of which had a different party theme.

Now, attention will move to the privately backed system's long-term reliability, and whether the line will meet an ambitious ridership goal of 50,000 passengers each day.

Not only are monorail officials confident that goal is reachable, they think the monorail will become a tourist draw itself.

"It will become an icon to Las Vegas, like the world-renowned cable cars of San Francisco," said Laurent Beaudoin, executive board chairman of monorail maker Bombardier Inc. of Canada. "It will serve as a model for future transit systems."

Added Jim Gibson, chairman and CEO of Transit Systems Management, the company that manages the monorail: "When I take my kids to Disneyland, we go in and my kids want to go on the monorail first. We think that's going to happen (here)."

Look ma, no driver

The monorail is the world's first fully automated publicly used monorail. In layman's terms, that means the trains drive themselves.

The system uses computers to safely operate as many as nine trains (consisting of four passenger cars each) at a time at speeds of up to 50 mph.

Each electric-powered train, riding a single rail, can seat up to 75 people and carry 150 standees. The trains run atop elevated tracks 20 to 70 feet above the ground.

The 4.4-mile system includes seven stops: the Sahara, Las Vegas Hilton, Convention Center, Harrah's/Imperial Palace, Flamingo Las Vegas, Paris/Bally's, and MGM Grand.

An operations center along Sahara Avenue will keep an eye on operations and security around the clock, using dozens of cameras placed at stations and inside trains.

Computerized kiosks will dispense tickets at a base fare of $3. Children age 5 and younger accompanied by an adult will ride for free.

There were some hiccups in rolling out the first-of-its-kind system. An axle fell from a train in January, halting testing for three days. And problems in the software controlling the trains led officials to push back the system's opening from January to March to today.

The system is not aimed at luring workday commuters in the car-reliant valley. But the monorail is expected to benefit locals by taking more than 4 million annual car trips off the Strip, thereby taking 135 tons of carbon monoxide out of the air.

Destination ride

Advertisers want to do more than make their trains a billboard. They're trying to create an "immersive and experiential marketing environment," according to Patrick Pharris, president of Promethean Partners, which is in charge of selling monorail ads and sponsorships.

The Monster Energy Drink train, for example, is covered not only with product logos, it's highlighting the lifestyle associated with the drink. The train has TV monitors showing other company-sponsored events, such as surfing contests and motocross races.

"It's one of the most visited cities in the United States. In one venue, you'll basically reach consumers across America," said Rodney Sacks, chairman and CEO of Hansen's Beverage Company, maker of Monster.

Other companies are following Monster's lead. Nextel, a wireless communications company, is sponsoring the Convention Center station, where the company is building a 15,000 square foot retail center that will include a sales shop, VIP lounge, business theater, concierge service and outdoor balcony with views of the Strip.

"You can't compare it to a subway. You can't compare it to a bus. If you want to compare it to something, compare it to a billboard in Times Square," Pharris said.

Monorail 1, Taxpayers $0

Those sponsorships are key to underwriting the line, which is thought to be the nation's first post-World War II rapid transit system that is entirely privately funded.

"We got nothing from the federal government. We got nothing from the taxpayers," Guinn said.

Planners were counting on more than $6 million in total annual sponsorship revenues to help repay bonds used to build the line. That now seems to be a pessimistic number: Nextel's deal alone will produce $5 million a year.

Pharris said he expects sponsorships to produce around $23 million in annual revenues.

Farebox revenues are expected to make up the rest of the difference. The system is counting on no fewer than 40,000 people riding the monorail each day at $3 a pop to generate $45 million a year toward bond repayment and operating costs.

Taxpayers will not be on the hook if the system founders. Monorail builders spent $23 million on an insurance policy to cover bond repayment if revenues fall short, Guinn said.

"My concern over everything else was we didn't want the state of Nevada on the hook for this," Guinn said.

What's next?

Planners envision the line extending to downtown Las Vegas by 2008, and to McCarran International Airport sometime thereafter.

There are no plans for the monorail to go beyond the resort corridor, but the line is expected to eventually tie into a future Citizens Area Transit transit center in downtown Las Vegas.

There, the system will plug into Metropolitan Area Express bus routes and a planned "CAT Rail" light-rail line between Henderson and North Las Vegas.

For now, monorail riders wanting to get downtown will be able to transfer to CAT Route 551 buses, which will run between the Sahara station and the Fremont Street Experience starting today. Fares will be 50 cents each way.

Although monorail officials are confident that 50,000 riders a day eventually will use the system, they're not sure 50,000 people will ride it today, or tomorrow, while the word gets out.

"It may take a little while," Gibson said.

And the system plans to run an abbreviated daily schedule of 8 a.m. to midnight through mid-September before hours are expanded to 6 a.m. to 2 a.m.

But Gibson got a good sign that eager riders were out there Wednesday.

"One of our people was putting up a sign that says the monorail starts operating tomorrow," Gibson said. "It took him one minute to put the sign up. A line started behind him."