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Friday, November 23, 2012

Las Vegas: Visitor Traffic on pace for Record High, Convention Attendance Lags

by Calculated Risk on 11/23/2012 08:34:00 PM

During the recession, I wrote about the troubles in Las Vegas and included a chart of visitor and convention attendance: Lost Vegas.

Since then Las Vegas visitor traffic has recovered and here is an update.

Through September visitor traffic is running just ahead of the 2007 pace (the previous peak) and it is possible Las Vegas will see 40 million visitors this year. However convention attendance is barely ahead of last year, and about 20% below the peak level in 2006.  Here is the data from the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority.  

Las Vegas Click on graph for larger image.

The blue bars are annual visitor traffic (left scale), and the red line is convention attendance (right scale). 2012 is estimated based on traffic through September.

The gamblers are back, but not the conventions ...