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A view of the pedestrian bridge that connects Lady Luck hotel towers in downtown Las Vegas is shown in this Sept. 21, 2010, file photo. The bridge obscures the view of The Mob Museum as you look north on Third Street.
By Dave Toplikar (contact) 
Wednesday, July 27, 2011 | 6:12 p.m.
Sun archives
- Tourism officials updated on progress of Mob Museum (10-13-2010)
- Mob museum gets about $15,000 more from state (10-6-2010)
- State pulls historic preservation grants to projects, including Mob Museum (9-21-2010)
- Mob Museum gets $500,000 grant (7-30-2010)
- City approves $7.1 million for mob museum exhibits (7-7-2010)
- City council accepts $300,000 more for downtown mob museum (6-16-2010)
- Union: City spending too much on mob museum (5-25-2010)
- Goodman tours mob museum, says ‘there is no competition’ (5-25-2010)
- Downtown Mob Museum set up to be self-supporting (4-21-2010)
- Downtown museum to tell story of mob in Las Vegas, elsewhere (3-25-2010)
In the old days, it might have been solved differently. Perhaps an unexplained explosion in the dead of the night. Or an offer they could not refuse. Fuggedaboutit.
That bit of irony wasn’t lost today on the Las Vegas Historic Preservation Commission. Members laughed, some thinking about what organized crime might have done about the Lady Luck pedestrian bridge, which blocks the line of sight north from the tourist-heavy Fremont Street Experience to the planned new Mob Museum.
Commissioners expressed some serious concern Wednesday about the 1980s-era bridge, which spans Third Street between the two Lady Luck towers, blocking the clear view of the Mob Museum along Third Street two blocks to the north.
The issue came up during a report on the status of rehabilitating the home of the forthcoming museum, which will open Feb. 14, 2012, in the former U.S. Post Office and Courthouse, 300 Stewart Ave.
“There’s been a lot of discussion over the years regarding the bridge,” Robert Chattel, the consulting preservation architect for the Mob Museum project.
“They have looked very closely at what could be done to remove the cladding on the bridge,” Chattel said. “The bridge will remain. The cladding will be altered to remain as transparent as possible.”
He said the plan is for the work on the bridge to be complete when the Lady Luck tower renovation work is completed.
“That will not be done, I would suspect, in advance of the museum opening,” Chattel said. “That would be done somewhat later. I believe they will have some kind of temporary improvement to the bridge prior to the museum opening.”
As part of his presentation, Chattel also showed some images of development being planned around the museum, including a proposed 12-story office tower just to the west, a two-story retail building and a pavilion area.
He said any new construction must be compatible with the historic character of the property, according to the National Parks Service. The parks service must approve all final designs, he said.
Commissioner Jack LeVine asked if there was any way that the bridge could be removed. Chattel said there was no way to have it removed — legally, getting laughs from commissioners.
Commission Chairman Bob Stoldal asked what more he would be able to see from the Fremont Street Experience once the bridge is made more transparent.
"Why are they spending any money to fix it if it's still going to be there?" Stodal asked.
Todd Kessler, of Resort Gaming Group, which is renovating the Lady Luck, said the bridge "will be a small as possible, based on the structural steel that's there." He estimated it is 12 to 14 feet in height.
"Removal of the existing cladding and the new cladding will be a nearly 100 percent improvement on the character of the bridge," Chattel said. "It is, at least in the design drawings that I've seen, very simple. The glass is nearly full height... It will be more transparent."
Commissioner Jarmilla McMillan-Arnold asked if the steel would still remain, or if the bridge would be truly transparent.
"I need to know how transparent you guys are going to make the bridge," she said. Kessler said the steel structure will still be seen through the glass.
"It's impossible to remove it," he said.
Stoldal said when he saw preliminary drawings of the planned 12-story retail tower that would be just to the west of the Mob Museum, "I got claustrophobic right away."
He said the buildings proposed to the north and east sides of the museum will also be almost as tall as the museum structure, which is about 45 feet in height.
He said he was also concerned about parking around the mob museum, which has space for 50 cars and some buses.
Kessler said currently there are only 50 spaces available now. But plans call for a new parking structure, with hundreds of parking spaces that will be available.
The commission plans to take a tour of the Mob Museum Sept. 28.
It's a travesty that a former courthouse is going to be used to glorify organized crime. Sure Goldman wants to celebrate them because that doesn't mean he spent his legal career defending murderous crime lords just quirky characters. That building deserves a better fate.
Boondoggle. Watch and see.
What is going on with the Lady Luck?
Sensationalizing criminal characters only breeds more of the same, Keep in mind these people that are to be portrayed are murders and thieves plain and simple. Perhaps for every display that you have how about showing the bloody picture of there victims after all you are appealing to a certain market.
One of the city's first major planning decisions was made in the early 1930's when the citizenry petitioned the U.S. Government to have the post office centered on 3rd street. The museum has all the documents with the original signers. The city sadly gave up its rights when they should have never done so.
C'est la vie...
Are you kidding me? A city that claims poor mouth and cuts services but is worried about a mob museum. Where is the money going to come from to pay for a new parking garage?
Can you say waste of taxpayers money?
I dont think we should glorify the mafia. While there is still plenty of pretend goodfella's, that's all they are, pretend. That time has come and gone. Start trying to achieve something a little better for your kids.
The mob musuem is pretty sad and I'm real disappointed this is still how the city portrays itself... Hello! You have families living here now, how about growing up? Or how about helping the locals out? Even back in the day they would at least treat the locals well... Now a days you hustled us for the housing market, cause aggrevation with all the construction, waste our tax payer money, and than have Tom collins telling us, "if you dont like to get out"... Its ridiculous.
Metro does not like the mob museum.
The don't like medical pot.
They don't like legal brothels.
They don't like pay cuts.
They don't like cell phones being used in cars. (unless it is their car.)
I wonder if they have a position on the bridge?
After all it is their county.
A bunch of Tweedle-Dums and Tweedle-Dums on the Historical Commission, passing for wise civic leaders. It's an ever-expanding BLOB that continually needs to eat completely unextraordinary neighborhoods in order to perpetuate itself. So now, we have all these declared "historical" neighborhoods and buildings which nobody can touch. Take the "Huntridge *West* Historical Neighborhood." This neighborhood is not to be confused with the older, original Huntridge area, which was built in the 1930's on the east side of Maryland Parkway. What *West* is, is a collection of later-model, small, run-down, rental properties predominantly filled by transient Latino families (often by more than one transient Latino family at a time). These dwellers don't know nor care about the "historical" designation -- it was 'done on their behalf' by the Blob that needs to perpetuate itself. Compared to historical edifices and districts like, oh, say Monticello, VA; St. Augustine, FL; or Hannibal, MS; what Las Vegas decides to call "historical" is *hysterical.* And an insult. To actual neighborhoods and structures which, indeed, are historical.
So now the Tweedle Dums and Dees can't undo their folly of having that eyesore of a pedestrian bridge put on the Historic Register. How perfect! This relic from the long lost...1980's -- in all it's schlockiness -- must be preserved FOREVER!
Where are all the anti-Nanny State big mouths when they actually have a case of government buttinsky-ness/ineptitude to gripe about?
Commissioner Jarmilla McMillan-Arnold asked if the steel would still remain, or if the bridge would be truly transparent.
"I need to know how transparent you guys are going to make the bridge," she said. Kessler said the steel structure will still be seen through the glass.
Obviously intelligence is not a requirement but just how exactly do these people get on these commissions?
A mob musuem in Las Vegas, no different than the Reptile House at a zoo.
Noindex,
They kiss up and get appointed. I believe -- but would have to check -- by the mayor. Anyway, this whole farce of a body is the plaything of a few boneheads who make things difficult for all the rest of us.
Is the bridge really hurting anyone? I mean really you think someone is going to look down from fremont street and actually see the museum and be drawn to it. No sorry Im not buying it. People will go to the museum if it is marketed properly. Not because they can see the building from a mile away.
Sounds like low attendance to the museum and someone is looking for excuses of why it's failing. That should be quite obvious and it has nothing to do with the view from the bridge...
Oscar Goodman, caters to the new mafias which are the casino owners; the mob museum is nothing but an insult to the victims of organized crime. Nothing funny about ruthless mobsters who killed for money, they also forced young woman into prostitution, slave people to a slot machine, money laundry which destabilize the world's economy, promote crooked politicians, etc, etc The government is too afraid to deal with this criminals and that's the reason why the own Vegas and they rule it with an iron fist.
A walk way from the Lady Luck to the Mob Museum will end up being used just like the Las Vegas Monorail system.
If there is any taxpayer money being used for this in any way I will be very unhappy. Stuff like this, and the proposed Caesar's stadium need to be paid for by the private interests who will take any profits from them. It seems that the only way things like this are profitable is when they take tax money first.