Goodbye to the Tropicana

February 18, 2025
By: Larry Trojak

A piece of Las Vegas history is disappearing from the city’s “just off the strip” landscape. The Tropicana hotel complex, once a world-renowned hub of Las Vegas betting and nightlife, is being systematically demolished to make way for a stadium that will house the city’s newest professional sports franchise. Heading up the effort to level nine structures — including a pair of 22-story towers — on the 34-acre site is Miller Environmental Inc. (MEI) of Orange, California. MEI has assembled a literal armada of equipment including no fewer than 10 Link-Belt excavators, a host of attachments, support equipment and a crew of more than 100 skilled personnel. As the phrase “drop the trop” enters the vernacular, and visions of the Rat Pack fade into obscurity, Miller is helping usher in a new era for Las Vegas.

Out With the Old

By Las Vegas standards — by almost any U.S. standards these days, actually — the Tropicana is ancient. First opened in 1957 (Little Richard was hot, as were Slinkys and Hula Hoops), it was, at the time, the most expensive Las Vegas resort ever developed, with a price tag of $15 million. Over the next six-plus decades, despite a series of expansions, multiple owners and several rebrandings, the Tropicana failed to keep up with the more popular, more elaborate, offerings on the Las Vegas Strip. This year, Bally’s, the Tropicana’s owner, came to an agreement with the Oakland Athletics baseball club ownership group to make available a huge portion of the site for construction of a new Las Vegas A’s stadium — setting the stage for the planned demolition of the Tropicana and the arrival of Miller’s team.

“When we first got on-site in March, we dealt with some minor asbestos abatement,” says Gregg Miller, MEI’s president and owner. “Despite the Trop’s age, there had been so many additions and renovations over the years that the bulk of the asbestos had already been removed. We quickly moved to demoing 100,000 square feet of smaller three- and four-story structures that were part of the original Trop layout.”

Though dwarfed by most of the newer mega-properties on the Las Vegas Strip, the Trop is far from lacking in square footage. Spread over that 34-acre complex was more than 1.7 million square feet of structures, including the pair of towers (725,000 square feet alone), a pair of parking garages (one above ground, one below), a pool/spa area, a theater, the casino gaming area and 184,000 square feet of support facilities.

The Two Towers

Both in size and stature, there’s little denying that the pair of guest room towers are the center of the Tropicana’s profile. Imposing when built, they remain so as demolition progresses. Though they will ultimately be imploded by NDA member Controlled Demolition Inc. of Phoenix, Maryland, Miller has taken a different up-front approach to that facet of the project.

“Because we plan to recycle the concrete and steel from each structure, we are choosing to gut each structure before implosion,” he says. “If we were to simply drop the structures as they are, we would contaminate that valuable debris with all the building components: the walls, the ceilings, the carpet, furniture and so on. So, working from the ground up, we are tackling an interior demolition effort three floors at a time. We have a dozen Bobcat loaders — two on each floor of each tower — gutting the rooms, punching a hole in the exterior wall and pushing the debris to a pile below. There, we have a Link-Belt 350 X4 equipped with a grapple/thumb loading out debris to end-dump trailers.”

Progress on the gutting operation is pretty impressive. On each tower, MEI is averaging six floors per week, after which each skid steer is set onto a platform and lifted by crane to the next target level to repeat the process. “This will allow us to have a relatively clean pile of steel and concrete after the implosions,” says Dave Anderson, MEI’s general superintendent for the project. “The concrete is being crushed on-site and will be repurposed, both as backfill and sold off for Class 2 base. The steel, on the other hand, is being taken to one of NDA member SA Recycling’s Vegas yards less than 5 miles from the site. It’s really been an efficient operation right from the start.”

Workout at the Pool

Different structures are demanding different demo techniques; the Tropicana’s mostly steel-constructed pool/spa area is a perfect case in point. For it, MEI used another Link-Belt 350 X4, this one equipped with a Genesis GXT 335R mobile shear.

“The resort is a fairly large area, about 110,000 square feet in size,” Anderson says. “The shear is pulling double duty there — pulling the structure apart, and then, when beams are freed up, downsizing them for transport. Another 350 X4 with a grapple/thumb is working alongside him and handling the loadout of that material.”

Despite the large acreage of the complex, Miller’s team’s focus is always on maintaining an orderly job site — hence the push to move material off-site as quickly as possible. “Really, the only piles you will find out here for any length of time are concrete that is being hammered and pulverized (using a 490 X4 and 250 X4, respectively) for crushing and reuse. Everything else is hauled off fast.”

Being Well-Red

By now, it should be obvious that Miller has a preference in his choice of excavators, and that preference is Link-Belt. The company owns 33 of the red machines, a huge percentage of which are currently at the Tropicana site.

“Because of the size of the job and the varied nature of all the work, we have 10 Link-Belt units at the Trop site,” Miller says. “Those include a pair of 750 X4s: three 490 X4s; three 350 X4s; one 250 X4 and one 145 X3. I’ve been a Link-Belt user since 2006 when I saw one of the larger demo firms in our area in California using it. I decided to follow their lead, and it was a good move on our part. The equipment is extremely reliable, it performs well, our guys love it and I get the best level of support possible from both Link-Belt and our dealer, Bejac Corp.”

Among the impactful features Miller and Anderson cite is the X4 Series’ use of Isuzu engines. Because they do not utilize a diesel particulate filter — one of the biggest causes of machine failure — the company experiences fewer engine-related service problems. By instead using an exhaust gas recirculation (EGR) system, nitrogen oxide pollutants (NOx) are reduced without sacrificing fuel efficiency or engine horsepower. Harmful emissions are lowered even further by an SCR (selective catalytic reduction) system, which removes pollutants to near-zero levels.

“Link-Belt excavators are also equipped with a proprietary control valve,” Anderson says. “That feature allows a particular machine to truly multitask — track, have bucket movement and swing — all without one action impacting the other. With project schedules getting tighter all the time, that really helps keep productivity up. And Bejac, which now also has a Las Vegas location, is excellent in seeing to our needs and minimizing the risk of any downtime.”

Time to Get Down

Other areas of the site MEI is currently tackling include 38,000 square feet of the casino/gaming area and a broad expanse of concrete that served as an apron and parking areas for the various buildings. For the hearty concrete removal, MEI called upon a Link-Belt 750 X4. The machine’s impressive breakout force coupled with an 84” bucket is making short order of both the removal and loadout. As the project progresses, Anderson foresees both 750s playing even more of a key role.

“The underground and foundation facet of this job will probably be the most challenging,” he says. “The footers for the Club Tower are built on caissons that are 19’ deep and sitting on caliche rock. There are also three tunnels that connect some of the buildings — ranging in dimension from utility-sized to pedestrian — as well as additional underground infrastructure. For all that work, we will equip the 750s with Epiroc HB 7000 hammers; they’ll have no problem with any of it at all.”

The implosion of the towers is set for October of this year, with a total project wrap-up slated for April 2025. By the project’s end, Miller estimates they will recover about 180,000 tons of concrete and asphalt and 9,000 tons of ferrous/nonferrous metals. “We are pleased with how well the Tropicana project is proceeding and are already getting set to begin work at the Mirage Hotel on the other end of the strip,” he said. “These are exciting times for both Las Vegas and Miller Environmental.”