special to ViewThe full Las Vegas Marathon route will affect traffic across the valley.
special to ViewThe full Las Vegas Marathon route will affect traffic across the valley.
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The third annual Las Vegas Marathon will take place on Sunday, and what that means for non-running locals, aside from more free entertainment, is street closures.
The race, which drew 16,400 runners last year and is already on track to top that this year, according to race director Terry Collier, will force the closure of streets starting as early as midnight the night before the race.
The route runs up the Strip from Mandalay Bay to downtown and then turns left, involving a large part of the western side of the valley.
This will be the second time the route runs through the center of the city. The inaugural route started on the Strip, but then went south into less densely populated parts of the valley.
Metropolitan Police Department Sgt. Chris Little serves on the department's dedicated Special Events Unit and noted that "several hundred officers would be handling the marathon, which is a little more than half of the manpower other cities, such as Chicago, generally require."
Since the event is so new, there's still a bit of a learning curve to overcome. However, the department seems to have been very successful in keeping the peace. Little said, "there were no major issues during the previous marathons."
The unit handles an assortment of events on a daily basis, requiring anywhere from 30 to several hundred officers, depending on the event.
During the last third of the year, they handle around 20 large-scale events, which this year included the Latin Grammy Awards, the implosions of the Stardust and New Frontier, the recent grand opening of Planet Hollywood, the National Finals Rodeo, and, of course, the Las Vegas Marathon. Each event offers its own unique challenges.
"The weekend of the NBA All-Star game was like five or six New Year's Eves," Little said.
The department is reimbursed by the organizers of the event for the officers' salaries.
"Because Las Vegas is a 24-hour town which requires longer street closures, we pay more for it than we might in other cities," Collier said. "But it's worth it for the venue; we factor it into our budget."
Collier explained that to get the word out to the members of the community directly affected by the closures, 55,000 door hangers will be distributed, as well as mailers sent out.
Although the marathon may be an inconvenience to some, it counterbalances that by drawing tourists to the city in an otherwise slow part of the year.
There will be 11 entertainment stages interspersed along the route, which will feature free performances by, among others, the Blue Man Group and musicians from Cirque du Soleil.
Over 50 couples will be married at a brief ceremony at mile 5, and the event is trying to break the world record for the most Elvis runners. The current record is 147, and the organizers of the event seem confident they will exceed that.
Also of note this weekend is the Great Santa Run, which will cause a number of downtown streets to be closed on Saturday morning.
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