Station Casinos tops off Durango resort in southwest valley

Construction cranes are now a common sight from the 215 Beltway in southwest Las Vegas, and several of them could be seen in action Friday morning to top off Station Casinos’ Durango resort.

Workers placed the final steel beam and poured concrete on the last floor of the 15-story, 216-foot hotel tower, located on Durango Drive off the 215 Beltway. Crews will start putting glass on the building’s exterior and furnish the property’s interior.

Scott Kreeger, president of parent company Red Rock Resorts Inc., said the topping off was a symbolic ceremony meant to highlight the progress made by the 1,600 construction workers, from general contractor W.A. Richardson Builders LLC, and about 100 additional contractors and other support.

“We’ve been waiting for the chance to open this project for a long, long time,” Kreeger said. “We’re super-excited to be a part of the community. Everyone in the community can expect all the great things that they typically get from a Station Casinos project. But at the same time, every time we develop a project we try to do something new and refreshing. We try to raise the bar.”

Station Casinos broke ground on the $750 million resort project in March, and it’s expected to open in the fourth quarter of 2023. Once complete, Station expects to employ 1,500 people.

The 211-room hotel will have an 83,000-square-foot casino floor, four signature restaurants, a collection of bars and lounges and an 11-unit food hall. The property will also have convention and meeting space, a resort-style pool with cabanas and nearly 4,200 parking spaces with 80 electric vehicle charging stations.

The topping tree is up 🌲

The Symbolism of a “topping tree” celebrates the completion of the skeleton of a building structure reaching its final height. The evergreen symbolizes good luck and prosperity for the future tenants of the building. pic.twitter.com/zkrWZirfPM

— Durango Casino & Resort (@durangoresortlv) October 7, 2022

Clark County Commissioner Justin Jones said he’s excited for the development occurring in the area — it’s enough that the county’s Public Works Department installed a new traffic light at West Maule Avenue and Durango Drive.

Nearby, the $400 million mixed-use development UnCommons welcomed its first tenants such as Urth Caffé and boba tea shop Teaspoon. Other sites in the area under development include the retail project The Bend, a Life Time Fitness health club and the Harry Reid Research and Technology Park.

“When you have a project like this, everybody else wants to be there,” Jones said. “Same thing that happened with Red Rock casino. You saw so much development that went in around there and it just complements everything else that’s going on over on this side of the valley.”

Station Casinos’ Durango project is just one of several projects in the pipeline. Kreeger previously told the Review-Journal that it has six projects in development that will double the size and footprint of the company in eight to 10 years.

“There’s no one more bullish on Las Vegas than Station Casinos,” Kreeger said at the time.

McKenna Ross is a corps member with Report for America, a national service program that places journalists into local newsrooms. Contact her at mross@reviewjournal.com. Follow @mckenna_ross_ on Twitter.