MANILA, Philippines- The world is big enough for two gaming capitals. And if you haven’t seen Las Vegas this year, as its newest tagline so cheekily points out, you haven’t seen Las Vegas.

In a city where reinvention is as common as Elvis sightings (thanks to the King’s army of bell-bottomed impersonators), a major development in Las Vegas’ nth repacking is the City Center, a 67-acre city-within-a-city between the Bellagio and Monte Carlo hotels.

Even as high rollers roll the dice (or pull the slot machine levers), MGM Mirage and a host of multinational partners are feverishly working on its $9.2-billion dream project. Set to open its doors late next year, the complex will feature, among other attractions, the Aria, a soaring 61-story, 4,000-room resort casino and convention center.

As a fitting tribute to Elvis Presley, who, in his latter years, became a favorite entertainment fixture in the Las Vegas circuit, one of the Aria’s featured attractions will be a Cirque du Soleil show anchored on his music.

True to the Cirque tradition, a custom-built theater within the hotel is being constructed for this purpose. If the Mirage, another MGM property, can mount “Love,” a Cirque show featuring Beatles songs, why not stage one honoring a true-blue American icon?

To keep the mix varied, the Aria will be surrounded by four luxury condominiums, including the Mandarin Oriental in its first foray in Las Vegas, and a series of high-end retail, dining and entertainment options dubbed as the Crystals.

Also scheduled to open next year is the Fontainebleau, a 3,800-room property that offers 390,000 sq ft of convention space. The Asian invasion continues with the opening of Echelon, a 5,000-room, $4.8-billion attraction consisting of five non-gaming hotels. One of its major investors is the Shangri-La group.

Indeed, amid rising fuel prices, new and exasperating baggage-weight restrictions at US airports (see related story) and the recent growth of Macau as the Sin City of the East, Las Vegas seems unfazed.

Red carpet

In a bid to further set the agenda, it recently rolled out the red carpet at the Las Vegas Convention Center for delegates to the International Pow Wow 2008.

Organized by America’s Travel Industry Association, the annual event, now on its 40th year, is the US travel industry’s leading international travel marketplace, generating more than $3.5 billion in travel to the country.

Representatives from more than 1,000 US travel organizations, including airlines, hotels, shopping malls and cruise ships, and nearly 1,500 international and domestic buyers took advantage of the five-day event’s opportunities “to meet and build friendships and business,” wrote Mark Chestnut in the International Pow Wow Daily.

Officials of the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority (LCVA), led by Rossi Ralenkotter, president and CEO, and Terry Jicinsky, SVP for marketing, announced several major developments and goals between now and 2011. Even for a city known for its Hoover Dam-size ambitions, its latest set of targets is at an all-time high.

By 2010, for instance, it expects to attract 43 million visitors. The number may be staggering, but it seems achievable considering that Las Vegas attracted 39 million visitors (4.7 million of which came from abroad) in 2007.

“Our hotels enjoyed a 92.4 percent occupancy rate last year,” said Jicinsky. “That’s 26.5 percent higher than the national average.”

The private sector is responding, recently adding 13,000 hotel rooms during the first half of 2008 alone. To meet the projected demand, 32,000 hotel rooms are currently under construction within Las Vegas and its vicinity.

Las Vegas remains the third top tourist destination in the US next to New York and Los Angeles. Not even Orlando, with its host of theme parks, can eclipse the original Sin City’s allure.

Twin strategy

But Las Vegas, unlike most of its guests, is taking no chances. Officials are banking on a twin strategy of attracting more international tourists and further diversifying the city’s offerings beyond gaming to achieve its goals.

To date, Las Vegas’ top three sources of foreign visitors are Canada, Mexico and the United Kingdom. In fact, 70 percent of the city’s international tourists come from its neighbors from the north and south Japan, South Korea and the advanced economies of the European Union also provide the city with steady sources of tourism revenue.

But Ralenkotter and company are looking deeper into Asia, particularly China and India, the region’s two emerging powerhouses, to boost the city’s tourism coffers. They’ve also cited Russia and Brazil as likely goldmines.

“International visitors tend to spend most of their time shopping, dining and enjoying entertainment options in Las Vegas,” said John Bischoff, LVCVA’s VP for brand strategy. “Overseas visitors, more so than domestic, also tend to visit the outlying destinations off the Strip, including Grand Canyon, Red Rock Canyon, Hoover Dam and Mt. Charleston.”

And, as if to downplay Macau’s clear and present threat to Las Vegas’ ambitions, officials even highlighted the fact that the former Portuguese territory also boasts of the same big-time investors as Las Vegas does.

“We’re competing with Macau in a real way,” said Jicinsky. “At the same time, with the presence of casino developers in Macau such as Sands, MGM and Wynn, it’s also an opportunity for us to market Las Vegas as an alternative to people who love to go there.”

Fundamentals

Such an expansion is anchored on sound fundamentals. The first phase of McCarran International Airport’s $4-billion expansion will open later this year. The entire project, including several concourses, a checkpoint annex and additional TSA screening lanes, will be finished by 2012.

Plans are also afoot to build a second airport. Once completed, the Ivanpah Airport can handle an additional 30 million passengers annually.

With such developments in the pipeline, both private and public sectors hope to advance the city’s appeal as the ultimate tourist destination beyond its captive market of gamblers within and outside the US. LCVA officials hope that word of mouth, more than glossy ads and catchy slogans, will ensure that whatever happens in Vegas doesn’t stay in Vegas.

Northwest Airlines, one of the event’s major sponsors, flies regularly from Manila to Las Vegas and other major US cities.