Monorail surely needs a connection to McCarran

Robert L. Candiotti, Las Vegas

Tuesday, Feb. 9, 2010 | 2:01 a.m.

Regarding a Jan. 29 article in the Las Vegas Sun, headlined “Las Vegas Monorail has few profitable options”:

As a Las Vegas resident who is a frequent Las Vegas Monorail customer, the monorail is a preferred travel option within the city. Generally, customers — now numbering 40 million since 2004 — seem to like the monorail a lot.

I know, though, things are far from perfect. The Las Vegas Monorail has a glaring weakness — it does not go just a little bit further south to McCarran International Airport.

Why the monorail system did not have a McCarran station when it opened in 2004 baffles me. What were the designers thinking? With millions of people arriving and departing McCarran each month, wouldn’t the benefits of a McCarran monorail station be a no-brainer?

Without a stop at McCarran, the monorail company has apparently been economically struggling along constantly. Now — as explained by Las Vegas Monorail CEO Curtis Myles — it has come to the point that the company has filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy for debt restructuring before moving forward with plans to finally construct a route extension to the airport.

To me, if the Bankruptcy Court ruling Feb. 17 goes against the company’s Chapter 11 debt restructuring request, the monorail will have no profitable option.

However, I firmly believe a monorail extension to McCarran (which would also enable another new stop at the Thomas & Mack Center/Cox Pavilion) would attract thousands of new passengers every day.

The distance from the monorail’s current final southern stop — MGM Grand — to McCarran is not very far. But lack of an opportunity for Las Vegas Monorail to operate through a Chapter 11 restructuring will keep the monorail from ever traveling that track to the airport.