{"id":322916,"date":"2024-06-18T15:06:40","date_gmt":"2024-06-18T20:06:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/?p=322916"},"modified":"2024-06-19T10:30:22","modified_gmt":"2024-06-19T15:30:22","slug":"ballys-facing-five-months-of-daily-demolition-for-chicago-casino","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/ballys-facing-five-months-of-daily-demolition-for-chicago-casino\/","title":{"rendered":"Bally\u2019s Facing Five Months of Daily Demolition for Chicago Casino"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bally\u2019s (NYSE: BALY) has a lot of work ahead to ready the Freedom Center site to become home to the operator\u2019s permanent Chicago casino hotel.<\/p>\n

\"Bally's
Chicago’s Freedom Center photographed in April 2022. Bally’s could face five months of work at 12 hours per day, seven days a week to demolish that building. (Image: Wikimedia Commons)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The regional casino company currently has five demolition permits under consideration by the city of Chicago. Each one pertains to a different structure on the property. Even if the city were to swiftly approve those licenses — arguably a specious prospect — demolition crews would need to work 12 hours per day, seven days a week for five months to get the site ready for casino resort construction.<\/p>\n

\n

Freedom Center is currently home to the Chicago Tribune<\/em>, which is expected to fully vacate the property by the end of July. While there are mounting doubts surrounding<\/a> Bally\u2019s ability to bring the permanent Chicago gaming venue to fruition — some experts believe it won\u2019t happen — expeditious approval of the aforementioned licenses and demolition is essential to the gaming company\u2019s efforts to meet an Illinois-imposed third-quarter 2026 deadline for opening the casino hotel.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

As of yet, none of the needed permits have been issued. Marlene Hopkins, Department of Buildings commissioner, told Melody Mercado of Block Club Chicago<\/a><\/em> that it could take 30 to 45 days to issue those licenses, but that\u2019s merely an estimate.<\/p>\n

Environmental Review Could Slow Chicago Casino Construction<\/h2>\n

Environmental reviews, particularly in large cities and states<\/a>, can be time-consuming endeavors and that could be exactly what Bally\u2019s is looking at in Chicago because the Freedom Center demolition is deemed by the city to be \u201cenvironmentally complex.\u201d<\/p>\n

For this type of demolition, the Chicago Department of Public Health (CDPH) follows a special process to carefully review the demolition’s potential impacts before any work begins. Then we make sure plans are in place to protect the environment and public health during the demolition,\u201d according to the city.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Environmental scrutiny of Bally\u2019s Freedom Center demolition is likely to be high, and the gaming company is expected to undertake painstaking efforts to comply with regulators\u2019 demands.<\/p>\n

Those include no use of explosives, imposing a 10-mile-per-hour speed limit on excavators used at the site, and even hand excavation in some circumstances. Additionally, the health department will have staff on-site daily to monitor dust proliferation and those employees are empowered to halt work if needed, according to Block Club Chicago.<\/em><\/p>\n

Weather Could Be a Wildcard<\/h2>\n

Even if Bally\u2019s can solve its well-documented financial issues<\/a> that are potential headwinds to its Chicago plans, and even if the aforementioned demolition licenses are approved in the near term, the Windy City\u2019s notoriously unpredictable weather could factor into the equation.<\/p>\n

\n

In a hypothetical example, even if Bally\u2019s could commence demolition of Freedom Center in August — a highly optimistic scenario — the five-month timeline implies some of that work could be stymied by the city\u2019s often harsh winters.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

As for construction of the casino hotel, the average timeline for ground-up construction of large hotels is typically measured in several months or up to a year, but that\u2019s assuming cooperative weather, smooth permitting, and no labor issues.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bally\u2019s (NYSE: BALY) has a lot of work ahead to ready the Freedom Center site to become home to the operator\u2019s permanent Chicago casino hotel. The regional casino company currently has five demolition permits under consideration by the city of Chicago. Each one pertains to a different structure on the property. Even if the city […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":46,"featured_media":243841,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[62,86430,86438,13592],"tags":[81897,86455,86457,81895],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nBally\u2019s Facing Five Months of Daily Demolition for Chicago Casino<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Bally\u2019s Facing Five Months of Daily Demolition for Chicago Casino.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/ballys-facing-five-months-of-daily-demolition-for-chicago-casino\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Bally\u2019s Facing Five Months of Daily Demolition for Chicago Casino\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Bally\u2019s Facing Five Months of Daily Demolition for Chicago Casino.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/ballys-facing-five-months-of-daily-demolition-for-chicago-casino\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Casino.org\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/Casino.OrgNews\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2024-06-18T20:06:40+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2024-06-19T15:30:22+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/Freedom_Center_from_the_south_1_4-1-22.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"800\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Todd Shriber\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@etfgodfather\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@Casino_Org\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Todd Shriber\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/ballys-facing-five-months-of-daily-demolition-for-chicago-casino\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/ballys-facing-five-months-of-daily-demolition-for-chicago-casino\/\",\"name\":\"Bally\u2019s Facing Five Months of Daily Demolition for Chicago Casino\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/ballys-facing-five-months-of-daily-demolition-for-chicago-casino\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/ballys-facing-five-months-of-daily-demolition-for-chicago-casino\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/Freedom_Center_from_the_south_1_4-1-22.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2024-06-18T20:06:40+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2024-06-19T15:30:22+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/f4cecf70a5032bc4e60eb73fc86d4a85\"},\"description\":\"Bally\u2019s Facing Five Months of Daily Demolition for Chicago Casino.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/ballys-facing-five-months-of-daily-demolition-for-chicago-casino\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/ballys-facing-five-months-of-daily-demolition-for-chicago-casino\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/ballys-facing-five-months-of-daily-demolition-for-chicago-casino\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/Freedom_Center_from_the_south_1_4-1-22.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/Freedom_Center_from_the_south_1_4-1-22.jpg\",\"width\":1200,\"height\":800,\"caption\":\"Chicago's Freedom Center photographed in April 2022. Bally's could face five months of work at 12 hours per day seven days a week to demolish that building. (Image: Wikimedia Commons)\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/ballys-facing-five-months-of-daily-demolition-for-chicago-casino\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"News\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Commercial Gaming\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/commercial-gaming\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":3,\"name\":\"Bally\u2019s Facing Five Months of Daily Demolition for Chicago Casino\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/\",\"name\":\"Casino.org\",\"description\":\"Latest Casino and Gaming News\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/f4cecf70a5032bc4e60eb73fc86d4a85\",\"name\":\"Todd Shriber\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/cropped-11-96x96.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/cropped-11-96x96.png\",\"caption\":\"Todd Shriber\"},\"description\":\"Todd Shriber is a senior news reporter covering gaming financials, casino business, stocks, and mergers and acquisitions for Casino.org. Todd got his start in financial markets as a reporter with Bloomberg News. Later, he became a trader at a Southern California-based long\/short hedge fund, where he specialized in the trading sector and international ETFs leading up to and during the financial crisis. He joined Casino.org in 2019. Currently, Todd analyzes, researches, and writes on ETFs for various web-based publications and financial services firms. Shriber has been featured and quoted in Barron's, CNBC.com, and The Wall Street Journal. His work can also be found on Benzinga, ETF Daily News, ETF Trends, MarketWatch, Fox Business, and Nasdaq.com. He currently resides in Las Vegas, where he enjoys golf and taking his black lab to the dog park. He's also an avid sports fan and likes to wager on college football and the NBA. You can also find him at the three-card poker and roulette table, even though he knows better. Contact Todd at todd.shriber@casino.org.\",\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/muckrack.com\/todd-shriber\",\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/toddshriber\/\",\"https:\/\/x.com\/etfgodfather\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/author\/todd-shriber\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Bally\u2019s Facing Five Months of Daily Demolition for Chicago Casino","description":"Bally\u2019s Facing Five Months of Daily Demolition for Chicago Casino.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/ballys-facing-five-months-of-daily-demolition-for-chicago-casino\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Bally\u2019s Facing Five Months of Daily Demolition for Chicago Casino","og_description":"Bally\u2019s Facing Five Months of Daily Demolition for Chicago Casino.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/ballys-facing-five-months-of-daily-demolition-for-chicago-casino\/","og_site_name":"Casino.org","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/Casino.OrgNews","article_published_time":"2024-06-18T20:06:40+00:00","article_modified_time":"2024-06-19T15:30:22+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1200,"height":800,"url":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/Freedom_Center_from_the_south_1_4-1-22.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Todd Shriber","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@etfgodfather","twitter_site":"@Casino_Org","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Todd Shriber","Est. reading time":"3 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/ballys-facing-five-months-of-daily-demolition-for-chicago-casino\/","url":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/ballys-facing-five-months-of-daily-demolition-for-chicago-casino\/","name":"Bally\u2019s Facing Five Months of Daily Demolition for Chicago Casino","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/ballys-facing-five-months-of-daily-demolition-for-chicago-casino\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/ballys-facing-five-months-of-daily-demolition-for-chicago-casino\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/Freedom_Center_from_the_south_1_4-1-22.jpg","datePublished":"2024-06-18T20:06:40+00:00","dateModified":"2024-06-19T15:30:22+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/f4cecf70a5032bc4e60eb73fc86d4a85"},"description":"Bally\u2019s Facing Five Months of Daily Demolition for Chicago Casino.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/ballys-facing-five-months-of-daily-demolition-for-chicago-casino\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/ballys-facing-five-months-of-daily-demolition-for-chicago-casino\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/ballys-facing-five-months-of-daily-demolition-for-chicago-casino\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/Freedom_Center_from_the_south_1_4-1-22.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/Freedom_Center_from_the_south_1_4-1-22.jpg","width":1200,"height":800,"caption":"Chicago's Freedom Center photographed in April 2022. Bally's could face five months of work at 12 hours per day seven days a week to demolish that building. (Image: Wikimedia Commons)"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/ballys-facing-five-months-of-daily-demolition-for-chicago-casino\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"News","item":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Commercial Gaming","item":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/commercial-gaming\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"Bally\u2019s Facing Five Months of Daily Demolition for Chicago Casino"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/","name":"Casino.org","description":"Latest Casino and Gaming News","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/f4cecf70a5032bc4e60eb73fc86d4a85","name":"Todd Shriber","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/cropped-11-96x96.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/cropped-11-96x96.png","caption":"Todd Shriber"},"description":"Todd Shriber is a senior news reporter covering gaming financials, casino business, stocks, and mergers and acquisitions for Casino.org. Todd got his start in financial markets as a reporter with Bloomberg News. Later, he became a trader at a Southern California-based long\/short hedge fund, where he specialized in the trading sector and international ETFs leading up to and during the financial crisis. He joined Casino.org in 2019. Currently, Todd analyzes, researches, and writes on ETFs for various web-based publications and financial services firms. Shriber has been featured and quoted in Barron's, CNBC.com, and The Wall Street Journal. His work can also be found on Benzinga, ETF Daily News, ETF Trends, MarketWatch, Fox Business, and Nasdaq.com. He currently resides in Las Vegas, where he enjoys golf and taking his black lab to the dog park. He's also an avid sports fan and likes to wager on college football and the NBA. You can also find him at the three-card poker and roulette table, even though he knows better. Contact Todd at todd.shriber@casino.org.","sameAs":["https:\/\/muckrack.com\/todd-shriber","https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/toddshriber\/","https:\/\/x.com\/etfgodfather"],"url":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/author\/todd-shriber\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322916"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/46"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=322916"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322916\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":323051,"href":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322916\/revisions\/323051"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/243841"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=322916"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=322916"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=322916"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}