Symphony Park: It's busy

LAS VEGAS (KSNV) — It's Friday morning and much of downtown Las Vegas’ Symphony Park is buzzing with construction. Its 61 acres, the site of the former train yard that gave birth to Las Vegas, has been touted and marketed by the City of Las Vegas for years as a prime spot for downtown renewal.

We see lots of building, all in Councilman Cedric Crear's ward.

“We're booming,” Crear told me.

For example, just two years ago, the Southern Land Company from Nashville broke ground on "Auric," a mixed-use residential complex. Fast forward two years, "Auric" will be accepting its first residents June 1st. And there's more.

“Really excited about this project. This will be our second and third project in the City of Las Vegas,” Kevin House, Southern Land’s VP of Multifamily Development, told City Council Wednesday, which approved another Symphony Park project from that same developer: a high rise development with 526 units.

Add that to the other developments going up there, “we will have over two thousand residents in Symphony Park,” said Bill Arent, the city’s deputy director of economic development.

Besides Auric, also under construction is a multi-family project by Aspen Heights Development from Dallas. It too is scheduled to open soon.

When COVID-19 hit, Symphony Park never really slowed down, "and isn't it amazing during the pandemic, that this construction continued? We obviously just opened up the Expo,” says Las Vegas Mayor Carolyn Goodman, who is talking about the World Market Center's convention complex, which welcomed its first customers just a couple weeks ago across the street.

So things have been busy. As a matter of fact, a city map indicates just a couple of parcels still available on these 61 acres. It's prime real estate that looks even better heading into a pandemic recovery.

Among those interested: Wednesday, the city council also entered into a negotiating agreement with the Sam Schmidt Foundation for a rehab center. Schmidt, a race car driver, was injured in 2000.

“Sam Schmidt's ‘Driven,’ which is spinal cord injury, is in talks with the Lou Ruvo Institute to see if they can build a complex together,” Goodman says.

The city wanted Symphony Park to be a sparkplug. It appears to be igniting, says Councilman Crear.

“It brings more density to downtown, which is gonna bring more people, it's gonna allow people to open up better businesses and more businesses,” says Crear.

Among other Symphony Park prospects, Mayor Goodman says the National Atomic Testing Museum, currently next to the UNLV campus, plans to move to Symphony Park. Goodman also says development is progressing on a hotel, anchored by Marriot, that would be built in the parking lot across from the Smith Center and the Discovery Children’s Museum.