Harrah's spending $30M on Atlantic City hotel renovations

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. (AP) - One of Atlantic City's top casinos is getting a $30 million makeover.

Harrah's is redoing 450 rooms and suites in the casino's Bayview Tower. The work will begin in mid-November and should be finished by Memorial Day weekend in 2017.

It is part of a race among Atlantic City's most successful casinos to remain competitive by reinvesting in their properties. Parent company Caesars Entertainment is spending $200 million on projects at Harrah's, including the recently opened Waterfront Conference Center, and planned improvements to The Pool After Dark, its fitness center and food court.

The newly redone rooms are close to the conference center, which Harrah's president Rick Mazur says is helping drive new business to Atlantic City.

"When we opened the conference center, we saw a lot more conferees and conventioneers coming to Harrah's, and to Atlantic City as a whole," he told The Associated Press. "This tower is the next closest to the conference center, and the rooms could use a refreshing. This is the first of several renovation projects we hope to be doing soon."

When the hotel renovation is done, 1,000 of Harrah's 2,600 hotel rooms will have been recently renovated.

Harrah's consistently ranks as No. 2 among Atlantic City's eight casinos, trailing only its neighbor the Borgata in terms of gambling revenue. In the first eight months of this year, it has won nearly $240 million from gamblers, compared with $516 million for the Borgata, and $225 million for its next closest competitor, Tropicana.

A unit of Caesars Entertainment that includes two sister casino properties in Atlantic City - Caesars and Bally's - is in bankruptcy court. But that filing does not include Harrah's.

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