Police predict huge New Year’s crowd on Strip

Jace Radke

Thursday, Dec. 14, 2000 | 11:25 a.m.

Last year's predictions of a half million revelers spending New Year's Eve on Las Vegas Boulevard fell short by about 250,000, but instead of being wrong, those prognostications may have just been premature.

Metro Police have been preparing for New Year's 2001 since completing crowd control operations last Jan. 1, and Deputy Chief Mike Zagorski wouldn't be surprised to see a crowd of 500,000 materialize in two weeks.

"Last year the numbers were down from what the hotels and convention authority were predicting, but we had the Y2K issue hanging over people's heads," Zagorski said. "A lot of people didn't want to be on planes or away from home when that changed over, and I think a lot stayed away. Now we have the real millennium, and there's no reason for people to stay away."

The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority is looking at about 270,000 visitors flooding into town over the holiday weekend, about 10,000 more than last year. The estimate does not predict how many of those visitors or locals will make their way to Las Vegas Boulevard, but LVCVA spokesman Rob Powers thinks there is a good chance that the number of visitors coming to town could still increase.

"I think that is absolutely a possibility," Powers said. "When people read that we are going to have one of the biggest fireworks shows in the country, there's no question they are going to be tempted to come."

The $500,000 fireworks display was announced Monday by the LVCVA and will be launched from the rooftops of 12 hotel-casinos and the Fremont Street Experience.

The fireworks are accounted for in Metro's New Year's plan, that is similar to year's past centering on the use of barricades, and over 750 officers in a massive exercise in crowd control.

"The fireworks will give the crowd something to do for about 10 minutes, but it's not something that really makes too much of a difference to us," Zagorski said. "Our goal is to make sure people stay safe, whether they are watching fireworks or doing something else."

The plan grows every year as things that work are kept and problems are addressed.

Among the changes this year will be the placement of temporary bathrooms in more areas along the Strip, and walkways will be created to allow revelers access to both sides of Las Vegas Boulevard.

"We found that last year near Flamingo Road we had a bottleneck, where people wanted to get from one side of the street to the other, and couldn't," Zagorski said. "We're going to create some avenues to permit that."

Metal barricades will begin appearing along the curbs on Las Vegas Boulevard in the afternoon on Dec. 31, and will eventually be used to provide an area for officers to regroup, and create easy lanes of access for emergency vehicles and reserve officers.

The barricades were first used in 1998, and allow police to gradually close the Strip to traffic by moving the barricades toward the center of the roadway from both sidewalks as the crowd grows.

Metro's mounted patrol will again be used for crowd control, and corrections officers will be on hand to transport people taken into custody to the Clark County Detention Center. Once at the jail a citation or an arrest could be the consequence for those creating unsafe situations, Zagorski said.

"We want people to have a good time," Zagorski said. "We'll be looking for the guys walking down the street punching people or people exposing themselves. Those are the kinds of things we want to put a stop to because they can lead to bigger problems."

Police also will be looking to enforce the county's bottle ordinance, that allows for only plastic containers on Las Vegas Boulevard during New Year's.

New Year's is a team effort of over 30 law enforcement, emergency services and utility agencies teaming to provide a safe environment, Sheriff Jerry Keller said.

"We expect great crowds, great times and great fun," Keller said. "We have 1,400 employees working that night with 30 other agencies to ensure safety is provided for all law-abiding citizens."