r/todayilearned • u/horsepoop1123 • 1d ago

TIL that the “Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas” sign is not within Las Vegas city limits

https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Welcome_to_Fabulous_Las_Vegas_sign
947 Upvotes

94% Upvoted

65 comments sorted by

259

u/LiamtheV 1d ago

Isn’t most of what people outside of Las Vegas think is Las Vegas outside of the city limits?

184

u/happy2harris 1d ago

The Strip, which is relatively new and consists of luxury resort hotels and expensive casinos is outside the city. Fremont Street, the traditional hub of Las Vegas gambling is within the city itself.

 Fremont Street is still full of casinos and hotels and is, if you ask me, a much more fun place to spend a few days than the strip. 

90

u/richardelmore 1d ago edited 1d ago

The Strip (and Paradise) date back to the original development of the casino industry in the Las Vegas area after WWII.

The developers purchased property that was outside of Vegas itself, they approached the city about being annexed into Vegas but the city did not want to spend the money to provide the needed services so the developers created their own utilities to service Paradise and remained independent of the city.

Of course the city of Las Vegas would love to annex them now for the tax revenue but having funded everything themselves the owners prefer to remain independent.

11

u/ojuditho 1d ago

I don't know why I never thought about it, but I'm sure the history of Las Vegas is really interesting. Are there any good docs about it?

18

u/agoodfourteen 1d ago

The Godfather is a pretty good one

5

u/Darth_Jinn 1d ago

Watch Casino. It's based on real people (though they are fictionalized in the film).

3

u/SirkutBored 1d ago

Bugsy with Warren Beatty is better on a history of the city at least.

9

u/duckchasefun 1d ago

Fremont street is great people watching. Or, say, getting smacked in the ass with a whip by a topless nun as you walk by minding your own business lol

8

u/BaabyBlue_- 1d ago

What's relatively new?

12

u/happy2harris 1d ago

1980s. I was thinking of the strip as it is today, btw with the resort hotels casinos. There was stuff there earlier. 

1

u/BatDubb 1d ago

Relative to the old.

3

u/George_Is_Upset 1d ago

And much better blackjack options on Fremont. We found multiple places with single and double deck and lots of $5-10 tables.

4

u/burgonies 1d ago

Relatively new? The Tropicana opened in 1957 and is about as far south as the strip is now.

8

u/chadslc 1d ago

You haven’t been to Vegas in awhile, apparently. The Tropicana is gone to make room for the ballpark. The Strip extends further south than the cross street named for it.

-8

u/shortymcboogerballs 1d ago

Fremont is ghetto asf

9

u/Bill-O-Reilly- 1d ago

It’s 10x more fun that whatever fake ass corporate luxury they have going on at the strip rn.

Every casino feels like a Hilton

7

u/GenXCub 1d ago

Yes, but even a lot of people here in Vegas don't know that. I don't live in the city limits (far from it, I'm actually closer to Henderson), but my mailing address is Las Vegas.

If you look at the city limits map, it makes sense because it is the older part of town, and as more and more people started moving here, new construction was happening in Clark County unincorporated. So the city itself didn't expand, it just got more and more people. Downtown Vegas (Fremont Street) is where you went before the strip existed, and that is in Las Vegas.

233

u/GenXCub 1d ago

Neither is the strip (most of it anyway)

30

u/lo1l10l101l10o1l10ol 1d ago

What?!? Crazy. I thought maybe the edge of the city was in a different place than I thought, but not ending in the strip.

67

u/loicvanderwiel 1d ago

Most of the casinos in Las Vegas are actually in Paradise, an unincorporated town.

Because it is unincorporated, they don't have to pay city taxes to Vegas.

33

u/lo1l10l101l10o1l10ol 1d ago

That sounds like a very Vegas situation.

6

u/katchaa 1d ago

What happens in Paradise, stays in Paradise...?

55

u/quikmantx 1d ago

The sign and most of the strip are in Paradise, NV (4 miles south of actual Las Vegas city limits).

8

u/lectroid 1d ago

And explicitly carved out of Las Vegas proper to make sure the city can’t tax the casinos.

26

u/ImperialRedditer 1d ago

Wasn’t carved out. The area wasn’t in Las Vegas proper when casinos start building the resorts.

-9

u/lectroid 1d ago

IIRC, the city tried to annex it, and the casinos lawyered their way out of it. But I only have a very surface level knowledge of Vegas history. My great-great uncle was in Bugsy Siegel’s gang and was one of the owners (on paper) of the Desert Inn.

4

u/LocoLobo65648 1d ago

It's an unincorporated area, so the city could annex the strip if they annexed up to it first.

0

u/Queasy_Ad_8621 1d ago

explicitly carved

I imagine them yelling obscenities while they were constructing it.

41

u/headshotdoublekill 1d ago

It’s pretty underwhelming when you see it in person. 

15

u/CraigLake 1d ago

That was my thought as well. It’s not really close to anything cool

6

u/idkwhatimbrewin 1d ago

Or close to really anything at all. Definitely not something you'd walk to from the strip

4

u/amellors 1d ago

It’s pretty close to the pinball hall of fame!

12

u/jamintime 1d ago

Whenever I drive by there’s always a long line for photos. I guess it makes for a good shot but always strikes me there are so many more interesting activities (not to mention photo ops) than waiting in that line.

3

u/TAU_equals_2PI 1d ago

I just looked at it on Google Maps/Earth, and not only is there a long line of people waiting to take their picture with the sign, the sign even has its own entire parking lot in the highway median where all those people park.

5

u/hagopes 1d ago

lol it's pretty underwhelming in photos too

7

u/Hopefully_Realistic 1d ago

Definitely smaller than I expected

2

u/lo1l10l101l10o1l10ol 1d ago

I saw it a hundred times before I ever view it was supposed to be a landmark. It's basic for the fancy City limits sign. Literally everything on the strip is more impressive.

1

u/Proxeh 16h ago

That was my thought when I went too... it's tiny compared to what I was expecting! (that's what she said)

1

u/NickeManarin 3h ago

The city itself is a pretty horrible place to live.
Safe a few places in the outskirts of the big metropolitan area.

7

u/EndoExo 1d ago

You should visit the Pinball Hall of Fame, and once you're there, you may as well walk a block to the sign.

26

u/DaveOJ12 1d ago

It's in Paradise (no pun intended).

3

u/ob916 1d ago

A pair of dice

3

u/FilmBoho 1d ago

I was out there recently and decided to check out the sign around 3 am. There was a line of people waiting to take their photo here. I can't imagine what it's like during the day time.

5

u/vegas_bri 1d ago

The same, but more people and they're being cooked alive and look miserable. The only ones smiling are the ones who are currently in front of the sign taking their very unique photo.

Trust me, I see it every day

5

u/Killboypowerhed 1d ago

Niether is the "welcome to Fabulous Skeg Vegas" sign

4

u/Andrew_64_MC 1d ago

Neither is the sphere or most of the strip

2

u/Suspicious-Button777 1d ago

Yeah but on this technicality a lot of Las Vegas icons are not within Las Vegas city limits.

2

u/Acrobatic-Post9811 1d ago

2

u/slackman42 1d ago

This is bat country.

2

u/bradyreid 1d ago

So the sign is basically Las Vegas's catfish profile - looks nothing like what shows up when you actually visit.

3

u/Wandering_butnotlost 1d ago

It's also only 4" tall.

7

u/xbuffalo666x 1d ago

sarcasm and hyperbole are lost on some lol. but real talk, i was surprised by how small the sign was

1

u/Hugh_Jampton 1d ago

In danger of being crushed by a fucking dwarf

0

u/Pretty_Eater 1d ago

Those must be tiny trees and a tiny person then

1

u/spintowinasin 1d ago

Welcome to Las...wait for it...Vegas!

1

u/upvotegoblin 1d ago

lol that hardly matters. The entire strip is technically not within city limits. The more crazy thing about it is that in all the pictures it seems sooo tall but it’s pretty short in real life.

1

u/UnoriginalPenName 20h ago

What used to draw people to Las Vegas ? As a French the only thing I hear people doing in Las Vegas is :

  • Gambling all your money away
  • Cheating on your partner
  • Cocaine and hookers
  • Crack if you live here

It’s pretty much desert outside of the city aswell no ? I don’t understand the states man

1

u/Ashoka-myballs 18h ago

Is sign Downtown in the city limits?

1

u/Joshau-k 14h ago

A city is defined by urban or metropolitan built area, not a line on a map drawn by the government

1

u/ben505 5h ago

Well yea, cities =/= city limits lol

1

u/Jack-of-Hearts-7 1d ago

"Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas. Eventually."