UPDATE — Statewide, bidders offer to put in 6,550 slot machines out of 15,000 possible. Cordish at Arundel Mills would be the largest — 4,750 slots at a $1 billion slots palace, in an adults-only building separate from the mall. Second largest number of slot machines would be 800 at Ocean Downs racetrack near Ocean City. See Ocean City Blog for details.
ORIGINAL STORY – The Cordish Companies, a global conglomerate specializing in real estate development and entertainment businesses, has entered a surprise bid for a Maryland license to operate a slot-machine casino at a surprise location, Arundel Mills, a mega-mall in Anne Arundel County.
The Cordish Companies is nearly 100 years old, based in Baltimore, a closely-held corporation with dozens of successful, high-profile retail and entertainment complexes in Maryland and around the USA. It is clearly the strongest and most serious bidder for five available slots locations in Maryland.
Cordish may be the ONLY serious, qualified bidder in a chaotic process that attracted only six bids for casinos at five locations. And bidders offered to install only 10,550 total slot machines out of 15,000 authorized by Maryland voters in November.
Arundel Mills is the newest and grandest mega-mall in the Baltimore-Washington region. It has 17 anchors and 225 specialty stores, as well as the largest, most popular movie multiplex in the area. Arundel Mills is 10 miles south of Baltimore, 20 miles north of Washington, and two miles from Baltimore-Washington International Airport.
Arundel Mills, which had not been on most people’s radar screens as a possible casino location, is at the interchange of the Baltimore-Washington Parkway (I-295) and Route 100. It is within an easy drive of millions of residents of the Baltimore and Washington metropolises, and it is virtually in the backyards of people in Columbia, Laurel, and Annapolis.
The Baltimore Sun quoted Joseph Weinberg, president of PPE Casino Resorts Maryland LLC, owned by The Cordish Companies, as saying, “Our proposed casino at Arundel Mills is one of the strongest gaming opportunities in the country.”
More to come . . . Much, much more. – Bernie Hayden
RSS - Posts
3 Comments
February 4, 2009 at 9:19 am
I truly hope Cordish is not the winner. After the mall we already have seen an increase in crime. I don’t even want to think what slots would do to traffic and crime. It’s up to all of us to contact our elected officials to keep slots out of Arundel Mills and most importantly out of Hanover. Let’s not forget this is also a residential area with many families that don’t want a casino in their backyard.
February 5, 2009 at 7:29 pm
I just bought a home right near the mall. I feel like I’m going to be sick. This is horrible. Just look at the Arundel Mills Mall under google maps. It’s surrounded by homes! They want to put the state’s biggest casino in the middle of a huge residential area? This will seriously degrade thousands of family’s home values and bring unwanted crime and drunk driving to the area. I can’t believe they’re going to do this…
April 4, 2009 at 7:37 am
With the traffic from the airport, the population around all the surrounding communities, government employess going to work, plus with 28,000 BRAC jobs and the road changes associated with BRAC-this area is OVERCROWDED. With all the people cramming into this area the slots at Arundel Mills makes NO SENSE AT ALL.