"Dispelling Vegas Myths: Linq Garage Solution to Flooding"
Note from the Editor: "Vegas Myths Debunked" publishes new entries every Monday, and every so often a bonus "Flashback Friday" edition. Today's entry in our ongoing series was originally written on August 12, 2022.
A stunned onlooker recording on their phone exclaims, "This is urban flooding in Las Vegas!" as they capture a rapid-flowing stream of shallow water gushing out of the parking garage at The Linq Hotel. Seven out of ten YouTube videos used this scene to showcase the water's intensity, including clips from Fox News and The New York Post.
What most tourists may not realize is that the Linq garage was designed to flood.
Underwater Mirage
The Flamingo Capri Motel, which opened in 1959 under a concrete overpass climbing over a water feature called the Flamingo Canal, was actually an earthquake-prone open flood channel named the Flamingo Wash. This water pathway collects rainwater from as far away as the Spring Mountains, approximately 60 miles west.
A powerful flash flood inundated Las Vegas in the summer of 1975, resulting in $25 million in damages. This flood overflowed the Flamingo Wash, destroying 300 parking lot cars at the Caesars Palace and carrying them miles away.
After two years, the Flamingo Wash was channelled into tunnels underneath Interstate 15, Caesars Palace, and Las Vegas Boulevard to reduce the chances of another severe flood. Flamingo Capri owner, Ralph Engelstad, had already completed the foundation for a 19-story tower and parking structure on the exact location where one of the tunnels now reached.
Since demolishing and rebuilding everything needed for the tunnel to continue underground would have been extremely expensive, Engelstad's engineers proposed an unusual solution. They made the ground floor of the Imperial Palace parking structure function as a diversion channel. Stormwater traveled through the underground tunnel and into the garage when flooding occurred. It then moved across the first floor towards a vented pipe behind the ramp, which directed it back underground.
Visitors are unaware of the parking garage's extra function unless a flood is imminent. Thankfully, this happens rarely, as it rains little (if at all) in the desert.
Overflow Management
The Flamingo Wash system wasn't an ideal one. In 1983, the garage saw a 2.4-meter-high (8-foot) wall of water. It ruined over 10 cars, which flooded more than 20 rooms on the ground floor and the casino floor, and left 500 gamblers fleeing onto Las Vegas Boulevard. A similar situation occurred in 2004 when two men in a car needed to be saved by firefighters from the water in the garage—the same location where six people managed to escape in 2017.
However, parking operations are usually the most affected. During heavy rainfall, the garage is closed to the public, and the first-floor cars are moved out. Once the rain has ceased, the water levels drop, and life returns to normal. While cars on the upper floors are sometimes stranded for a few hours, that's the worst-case scenario.
Untouchable Solution
In 2010, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported that the Clark County Regional Flood Control District deemed it impossible to design a better solution without weakening the foundation of the Imperial Palace, the structure built upon this natural flood-prone area.
In 2005, Harrah's Entertainment bought the hotel. CEO at the time, Gary Loveman, shared with investors his idea to implode the building to enlarge nearby properties. If they had done so, it might have solved the ever-flooding parking garage. Unfortunately, the Great Recession arrived, so instead, they chose to build The Linq over the old Imperial Palace ruins.
To this day, the Clark County Regional Flood Control District alerts The Linq whenever it anticipates a large storm. Not because it is at risk of flooding, but because it is expected to do so, and they follow a treatment plan to manage the outcome.
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Source: www.casino.org
