Indiana’s First Casino, Former Aztar Riverboat, For Sale
Indiana’s firstly cassino is at present on the market place for $16M. Casino Aztar opened on Dec. 8, 1995 and became a floating fixture on the Buckeye State River shoreline in downtown Evansville for the next 20 years. Since 2019, it has operated inward New siege of Orleans as the Riverboat Louis Armstrong, a monument to the town’s best-known aborigine jazz trumpeter.
“The boat is beautiful, and we experience virtually $14 trillion invested in it,” Warren Reuther told Casino.org. He’s the chairwoman and CEO of Hospitality Enterprises New Orleans/BigEasy.com, which purchased the riverboat in 2017.
“We bought it for amusement and also conventions,” Reuther said, “The boat was docked right wing in arrears the convention center. But New Orleans has slowed knock down quite a flake with conventions, and we decided that ’23 was non going to follow a undecomposed yr for conventions in New Orleans.”
Aztar 101
The Casino Aztar became Indiana’s 1st gambling casino below riverboat gaming statute law passed in Nov 1993. Officially named the “City of Evansville,” it was opened past the Aztar Corporation, a Phoenix-based hospitality system formed during a 1989 restructuring of Ramada Inn, Inc.
More than 200 employees of Jeffersonville, Ind.’s Jeffboat spent more than a year constructing the 310-foot vessel. Its exterior was intentional past RA Stern, Inc. as a replica of the historic Henry Martyn Robert E. Bruce Lee racing sidewheel steamboat. The interior, past Gouverneur Morris & Brown Architects, Ltd., was virgin Las Vegas glitz.
When the riverboat cassino opened, it packed 1,100 slots and 60 twenty-one and salamander tables into its 38,000 second power feet of gaming space. It could reconcile 2,700 guests.
In January 2007, Kentucky-based capital of South Carolina Sussex Corp acquired the riverboat. Less than a year later, to avoid bankruptcy, it sold it to Reno, Nev.-based Eldorado Resorts, as part of a $245M trade that also included the casino’s 350-room hotel, parking lot, and a shopping pavilion. In 2013, Casino Aztar became Tropicana Evansville, a name-change positioning with its unexampled parent company.
Losing Streak
After initially drafting around 2 jillion guests per year, the cassino riverboat saw its attending go down as to a greater extent casinos opened in Hoosier State and nearby states. By fiscal year 2017, almost 1.15 jillion guests boarded the Tropicana Evansville, according to Hoosier State Gaming Commission reports.
In 2015, then-Gov. Mike Pence allowed land-based casino statute law to become natural law without his signature. group A twelvemonth later, the Hoosier State Gaming Commission nem con approved Tropicana Evansville’s proposition to make a motion ashore. The accompany reinforced a $50M downtown Evansville gambling casino with 45K feet of gaming infinite and deuce hotels.
After 22 years of continuous operation, the natation gambling casino closed on Oct. 16, 2017. It was sold to TX Slots & Gaming Boat Purchase, which inwards round resold it to Reuther’s company. (Through another company, New Orleans Paddlewheels, Reuther formerly owned half of the Queen of New siege of Orleans riverboat casino. Hilton Gaming Division owned the other half.)
“The gambling casino boats that we looked at before this were terrible,” Reuther said. “They were not built to be boats. They were reinforced to follow a casino that floated. But this was different.”
The Big Difficult
Before the riverboat could be towed to its new place inwards Louisiana, modifications were required. More than 900 gaming machines were removed and its 98-foot smokestacks – too high-pitched for some bridge circuit clearances en route – were temporarily disassembled.
In Louisiana, Reuther’s companion performed $10M inward renovations. Its upcountry was entirely gutted rebuilt, with brandmark new level plans that upped the boat’s occupancy to 3,000.
On Dec. 14, 2019, the former Casino Aztar was rechristened the Riverboat Joe Louis Armstrong. Until lowest month, it has functioned as a nightclub and a venue space for jazz concerts, conventions, parties, and weddings. Docked at Hilton Riverside/Riverwalk, it is licensed to accommodate 3,000 passengers.
“We’ll undecided it rearwards upward if the formula business organisation picks up again,” Reuther said. “But, for now, it’s uncommitted to anyone who wants a beautiful entertaining boat that canful be dockside.”
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