Mirage Resorts Inc. takes control of land for Atlantic City

Friday, Jan. 9, 1998 | 11:11 a.m.

The company took title to the 150-acre parcel Thursday, about 18 months earlier than planned.

"They came to us and asked if we'd be interested in accelerating it. We were delighted they wanted to take the property and formalize their presence in the town," said Louis Toscano, policy adviser to Mayor James Whelan.

The city tried for years to sell the property, once the site of a municipal landfill, and ultimately gave it away once Mirage proposed its 2,000-room Le Jardin Hotel & Casino in early 1995.

The ownership transfer marked a long-awaited first step for the project, plans for which were announced in 1995 but delayed by infighting among casino interests and the state's plan to help Mirage build a $330 million highway tunnel improving access to the site.

"There are three real benchmarks in this project. This is one of them," said Whelan, listing the others as the start of construction and the opening.

Mirage officials were eager to speed up the process in hopes of stemming any blocking of the project, which has been vigorously opposed by Donald J. Trump and by Hilton Hotels Corp. officials.

"It takes some of the politics out of the project," said Richard Bronson, president of New City Development Corp., Mirage's development subsidiary. "We would like to keep the project moving forward. We're spending millions of dollars in design work."

Environmental cleanup is to begin sometime this year, followed by a fall groundbreaking.