Atlantic City, the struggling and diminishing gambling Mecca of the US may be getting another casino to join the battle for the scraps.
Bruce Toll, owner of BET Investments has reportedly paid $5.5 million to Trump Entertainment Resorts to get cancel a deed restriction on land it owns near the Boardwalk.
Without the restriction, Toll can now proceed to pursue casino gambling on the site formerly held by the Playboy casino, then later the Trump World’s Fair casino. The latter was demolished at in the beginning of the century.
It is possible that Toll could build a casino on the property given the restriction has been lifted, but there are no reports indicating that he will do that at this time.
Frankly, Atlantic City is probably one of the last places you would want to build a land-based casino at the moment, Pennsylvania sounds like a more attractive option these days.
Atlantic City has been struggling and continues to struggle. Donald Trump himself once proposed building a 62-story, 4,600-room hotel and casino on the site. As Times Union reports, in 2005, when the corporate predecessor to Trump Entertainment Resorts entered bankruptcy protection for the second time, Trump had to auction off the land and give the proceeds, plus $17.5 million in cash, to his creditors.
It’s hard to see Toll having any real success building a multi-million dollar casino with way things are going economically in AC.
