The new Revival Reno project is finally looking to do something with the old Harrah's Building in downtown Reno.
If you've lived in Reno long enough you might remember the casino. Since doors closed in March of 2020, the bright vibrant colors have faded away and a gutted building remains.
There was new light shed when CAI from Caesar's Entertainment bought it and had big visions for the Reno City Center.
After years of work, the developers filed for bankruptcy last year. When it seemed like the project was doomed, a fresh set of eyes wanted to roll the dice on the 775.
"It was in bankruptcy and had its problems. Our background, we've developed a lot of downtown Boise. In fact, we're on our fourth city block right now," said Tommy Ahlquist, CEO of Ahlquist LLC. "To watch what happened to Boise and how it changed, and you come here, immediately when you come here you see it has tremendous potential. So, that's why they called us, and it's been a lot of work. Its been hard. I got to give a lot of credit to the people here on the ground."
Earlier this year, Madison Capitol Group purchased the property and brought in Ahlquist to help with the development, which brings us to Revival.
"This is where they come play. We'll have places to work here and places to live. So, when you combine all of those things in a downtown environment it could really take off," Ahlquist said. "Really energize and change a downtown, revive it, and I mean that's the name, Revival."
On Wednesday night, the Reno Planning Commission approved a tentative map for the project. Which spreads out the property into 33 parcels. The developers say it allows for much more flexibility with bringing in more ownership to the property.
"I don't know why they didn't get one from before, but the very first thing we did when we got here is that we have to go get a tentative map done on this," Ahlquist said. "Just thinking about all of this, it does give us flexibility on ownership and it's just essential, and it's the right way to do on something half as big as this, let alone two city blocks with hundreds of thousands of square feet."
We were given a tour of what the building currently looks like. The last developers had a lot of it gutted, which does help set up the foundation once more construction is started.
"Many people might not know where the project ended but a lot of the work was done on the multifamily tower, in fact about 80 percent of the work that was done on the north tower," Ahlquist said. "The south tower has been fully demoed and ready to."
It also includes office spaces that are ready to roll. A previous tenant with the last developer was set to take them, but now they are back on sale. Ahlquist says there is a lot of interest in them.
The previous casino floor of the Harrah's is looking be packed with restaurants.
Johnathan Fine, Co-Founder of Fine Entertainment, will be handling all of that on the first floor. He was involved with the last developer group as well.
"He had already put in a lot of money into those spaces. It'll be very similar what he has in Vegas," Ahlquist said when talking about Fine.
The plan is to also bring a grocery store to the project, along with housing and hotel rooms.
The entrance is purposed to be on University Avenue for the residential and office spaces, as well as the restaurants next to a 900-spot parking garage.
Ahlquist announced ESI will be running the construction and Gensler will be the main architect
After many have waited to see if this building will be revitalized again. Ahlquist says he also wants to put more words to actions.
"Our team here is fantastic. The city's been great. It's just time," he said. "At some point you're tired of talking, tired of everyone being like, 'what's going on?' You will start seeing action, we'll have a groundbreaking to get going."
Ahlquist says the plan is to start construction in September, hoping that some things will open up by the middle of next year.
He says there still needs to be a little more work done in the interior. He also shared that he has some good lenders potentially lined up but didn't want to share who they were at this time.
