How will Strip workers get around during F1? LVCVA thinks it has an answer

Getting thousands of hotel workers to and from their jobs during the Formula One Las Vegas Grand Prix next month will be no small feat. On Tuesday, Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority took a step forward to ease that challenge.

The authority OK’d the bidding of a $300,000 contract for a park-and-ride shuttle bus system planned to aid the movement of resort corridor employees during the November event.

With a large portion of the Strip to be shut down for several hours a night during race week Nov. 16-18, getting the resort workers to and from work is a key element officials are working toward fine tuning.

Approximately 23,000 hotel rooms are within the race’s footprint, which includes portions of Harmon and Sands avenues, Las Vegas Boulevard and Koval Lane.

Roads will begin to close around the race’s circuit beginning at 5 p.m. and are planned to be fully closed by 7 p.m. Roads are scheduled to reopen at 2 a.m. after each day’s events.

Getting workers to their jobs

During that time roughly 10,000 hotel employees will need to get into the race area to get to work, according to Steve Hill, LVCVA president and CEO.

The convention authority is opening up 4,300 parking spots at the Las Vegas Convention Center where Strip employees can park-and-ride into the Strip on the Las Vegas Monorail or via the buses. The LVCVA expects to have 25 buses running daily to transport workers during race weekend.

Hill said he expects the monorail to reach capacity at times during Grand Prix weekend, so the authority wants to have another option for those workers to get to their respective properties.

“So we want to encourage people to park here and if it’s (the monorail) available to use it, but because we know that at time the monorail is going to be full or close to full, having the ability to offer buses allows us to make sure that the monorail is maximized,” Hill said.

The bus service will be free to employees, while the monorail will be paid for by the individual employees or the property they are employed by. Locals are able to purchase $1 rides on the monorail every day, including race weekend.

Las Vegas Mayor Carolyn Goodman, who also sits on the LVCVA board of directors, suggests the respective properties foot any bill for employees paying to ride the monorail to and from work during F1 weekend.

“I would highly recommend the employers step to the plate, whoever those employers are,” Goodman said. “I think the inconvenience, knowing the phone calls we get and emails sadly through all of this construction, I think it would be a very kind and good gesture.”

Approximately 10 satellite parking lots also will be used by the resorts outside of the convention center’s scope.

“We’ll use these buses to the extent that they’re available, but having the four bridges for access, we want to make sure we have the most efficient way to move people in and out of the circuit,” Hill said. “Particularly during those hours that it’s closed. Buses are obviously the best way to do that because we can get 50 people on a bus instead of one, or two, or four people in cars, it just makes the limited access inside the circuit more efficient.”

Monorail, shuttle buses to operate all three race days

The monorail and shuttle bus system will operate all day during the three days of racing, Hill noted.

The monorail will be the most effective way to move around the Strip during race weekend because it travels above the roads and surface traffic. “Because it is not taking any roadways or any bridge capacity in order to do that,” Hill said.

The routes the buses will take to each destination are still being finalized, but Hill said there will be up to four alternative routes from each parking location in the event a detour is needed.

“There’s the most desired route, which is probably the most direct line between where they park and those bridges that are available for vehicles to go inside the circuit,” Hill said. “Since this is the first time we’re doing this race, we’re going to learn as we go and we want to be able to tell a driver of a bus to move from Route B to Route A because it is a better route into the circuit.”

Contact Mick Akers at makers@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-2920. Follow @mickakers on X.