Make the casinos pay for I-11

[Henry]

Wouldn't Phoenix benefit from increased traffic from people in Vegas? Wouldn't other destinations along the way benefit as well?

Besides, the last thing Vegas would want to be is an Atlantic City-type destination, where people just come for the day...or maybe overnight.   They would much rather invest in (well, they have) an airport that makes it convenient for people to fly in from distant areas, intending to stay for several days.

The thing is, Vegas isn't as close to the major cities as Atlantic City is. For instance, Atlantic City is within 200 miles of Philadelphia, New York, Baltimore and Washington. I believe that the closest city to Vegas is Los Angeles, and even that's 270 miles away.

[Scott5114]

Those that drive are probably coming from the nearest metropolitan area to Vegas, namely, Los Angeles—San Diego, so they wouldn't be using I-11 anyway.

Everything makes sense until here. The idea that Phoenix people won't drive to Vegas because LA-SA is slightly closer and only people from the nearest Met area would drive.

Totally agree with you on high rollers and $5 being small change to them, in the unlikely event that they drive in, just don't get the logic of the last sentence.

The logic is that I forgot Phoenix exists. LA—SD dwarfs Phoenix, however, and I would expect that travelers from Southern California make up the lion's share of visitors arriving in Las Vegas by car.

Actually, to make the toll a matter of 100% indifference to gamblers coming from Phoenix by road, the casinos would likely have to comp about $50.  This is based on the proposed toll rate of 13.5c/mile for the Boulder City Bypass (chosen on the basis of its being the median per-mile toll rate for recently opened toll roads) being applied to the total 292 miles between Phoenix and Las Vegas.  From the casinos' standpoint this is about $200 million tops out of total annual turnover of about $10 billion, which admittedly is not much (no more than 2%), though the effect on overall profitability is unclear.

It would be much less than that actually spent. A casino does not offer comps to any patron that walks in the door. Nearly every casino has a player's club program that essentially functions the same as a loyalty card program at a grocery store. Players are encouraged to allow their play–'coin-in' in casino jargon–to be recorded against their account. Coin-in, along with frequency and duration of visits, are run through a complicated formula to produce a player's 'rating'. (Note that 'coin-out', or winnings, is totally disregarded for the purposes of this calculation. The casino can reasonably predict your expected payout over time from just the coin-in–it will likely be within a few percentage points of 95% of coin-in.) This rating is what is used to determine the level of comps that are to be extended to the guest.

However, even if the player would qualify for a comp, it may not be actually issued. Not all players will play with a card (in fact, some refuse to, either out of paranoia or because they feel it's bad luck), and not all who do will actually redeem the offer. Likewise, it takes time to build a rating–casinos like to see a consistent amount of coin-in per visit before they will grant comps other than the introductory offers used to induce patrons to sign up for a card.