Question of the Day - 23 April 2024

It’s tempting to imagine that, Vegas being Vegas, there would be a rush to call it Athletics Avenue or Fisher Boulevard (the latter after the Oakland A’s owner). After all, Sin City has a Hugh Hefner Way, even though Hef’s connection to the Palms was both tangential and temporary. We also have a street named for Al Davis, never mind that the Oakland Raiders' owner was long gone by the time the team began playing at Allegiant Stadium.

That said, when it comes to street names, Las Vegas is curiously nostalgic. Why curious? Well, this place feels little nostalgia for anything else, grinding up history eagerly to make room for the Next Big Thing. When the Sahara briefly became SLS Las Vegas, there was no corresponding rush to rename its signature street SLS Avenue, thank God. There wasn’t even a peep about calling it Nazarian Boulevard.

Likewise, Flamingo Road will surely always be Flamingo Road, no matter what happens to the eponymous casino. After all, the idea of flamingoes frequenting Las Vegas is an evocative image.

And long after Steve Wynn became persona non grata, there’s still a Wynn Road. Maybe our city fathers rationalize that they can pretend it's named after Elaine Wynn instead.

And don’t even get us started on all the places and things named after the late Howard Hughes!

Besides, Tropicana Avenue stretches from the far western end of the valley to the far eastern end and countless business and residential addresses have been tied to the name for decades. So it's hard to imagine that the county would go to all the expense of changing the street name, not to mention the outcry from all the businesses and residential owners, just because it's no longer tied to a casino. 

Still, for an informed perspective and a second opinion, we turned to University of Nevada-Las Vegas history professor Michael Green. He weighed in as follows. “It’s an interesting question, because we have several streets named for defunct casino properties, so I'm guessing not. 

“Desert Inn Road is still Desert Inn. There’s still a Sands Avenue. But there’s a cute story. They were renaming a street and wanted to call it Flamingo and others argued for the Dunes. There used to be a sign on the freeway exit: ‘Flamingo-Dunes.’”

So we feel reasonably safe in assuring you that you’ll be driving down Tropicana for a long time to come … regardless of what eventually stands on the southeast corner of its intersection with the Las Vegas Strip.