The decline continues despite an improving economy.Ī more relevant harbinger for Rhode Island may be the southeastern Indiana market, which historically relied heavily on business from Ohioans. It was a $2.9 billion market last year, according to the Center for Gaming Research at the University of Nevada Las Vegas. Atlantic City was a whopping $5.2 billion gambling market in 2006, but casino expansion in Pennsylvania, Maryland, and elsewhere has ravaged the city’s bottom line. Nowhere is the effect of competition more dramatic than in Atlantic City, the modern casino industry’s East Coast beachhead, which opened for gambling in 1978. “They will try with marketing to differentiate themselves, but if you’re a casino 10 miles from a population, you have a huge advantage over a casino that’s 30 or 40 miles away.” “It’s tough for casinos to respond to increased competition that has a locational advantage,” Nichols said. Nichols, a professor and casino expert at the University of Nevada Reno. Part of the problem is that casinos generally offer similar games, so day-trip gamblers tend to default to the closest, most convenient casino, said Mark W. Once gambling customers are lost to newer properties it is extremely difficult to get them back, specialists say. The anticipated loss is going to have a significant impact on the ability of the state to finance its services, Sasse said. Massachusetts plans to license gambling resorts this year in Springfield, the Boston area, and possibly Southeastern Massachusetts, where tribal and commercial casino plans are pending.Ĭasino expansion in Massachusetts is expected to cost Rhode Island state coffers $422 million from fiscal 2015 through fiscal 2019, according to a forecast from Governor Lincoln Chafee’s administration. The Plainville slot parlor, to be developed by Penn National Gaming at the junction of Route 1 and Interstate 495, will be in a strong location to intercept traffic to Rhode Island when the slots open next spring.Īnd the competition is only going to get tougher for Rhode Island, which also makes money from a slot parlor in Newport. “If you take Interstate 95 from Rhode Island down to Maryland, the market really hasn’t grown over the past couple of years,” casino consultant Frank Fantini said. Many of Twin River Casino’s patrons travcl to Rhode Island from Massachusetts.

Boston to twin river casino