I understand that paid parking is a sore point with LVA, specifically recalling a comment that said even organized crime bosses weren’t that greedy, but a picture on Vintage Las Vegas caught me off guard. The photo is from March 1973. Look at the Holiday Inn billboard between the Flamingo and Caesars Palace signs which advertises "FREE PARKING". Kind of implies that parking wasn't free everywhere on the Strip almost 50 years ago. Could paid parking on the strip not be a new idea?
“Free Parking” signs could be seen on the Las Vegas Strip at least as late as September 1991, at which time the Frontier was prominently hawking that amenity to get customers to stay and play (see photo below).
However, as for the Mob charging customers for parking (see second photo, submitted by the questioner and used with permission from VintageLasVegas.com), we consulted a bevy of Strip experts and rolled snake eyes.
Mob Museum Vice President of Exhibits & Programs Geoff Schumacher says, “I don’t recall there being any paid parking on the Strip back in those days. Most of the parking was in large surface lots. I have to wonder why [the Holiday] was touting free parking at all. “
David G. Schwartz, biographer of Caesars Palace founder Jay Sarno, adds, “I'm not aware of paid parking on the Strip in that period. Given that most casinos had surface lots and not garages, it’s difficult for me to understand how that would work. I could be wrong, though.”
University of Nevada-Las Vegas history professor Michael Green concurs.
And longtime Strip dealer turned casino consultant Dennis Conrad writes us to say, “No, I don’t recall any paid parking examples back in the day, other than a few downtown examples like Plaza and El Cortez, where you would have to pay if you didn’t get your parking ticket validated. Sorry, I don’t know why the old marquee said that. Maybe they opened with paid parking and quickly got slammed for it and immediately changed the policy? Not so quick to change egregious policies nowadays …”
