Las Vegas Rail Stopped in Tracks

Patricia Williams looked up at the empty monorail track in front of the Las Vegas Convention Center and contemplated what should have been a quick, cheap and scenic trip.

“We’re taking a taxi, and it sucks,” said the 42-year-old nail-care consultant from Baldwin, N.Y., waiting with a friend for a $12 cab ride.

If the $650-million rail project was not months behind schedule, she could have whisked between the always-busy Convention Center and some of the strip’s biggest hotel-casinos for $3. Instead, empty trains glide between stations on elevated concrete rails above a side street behind the Las Vegas Strip.

The opening, originally scheduled for Jan. 20, was postponed to March -- and then to sometime this summer. The delays came after a drive shaft fell off a train during testing in January and technicians detected a glitch in a computer control system in February.

“It’s not going to open until it’s reliable and able to provide an efficient and safe mode of transportation,” said Cam Walker, president and chief executive of Transit Systems Management, the private company in charge of operating the monorail.

The drive shaft was fixed. But Walker said the software problem has proved more daunting: The control system is designed to keep a safe distance between trains running at up to 50 mph on the 3.9-mile track.

Once the system can handle seven trains at a time, it must run for 30 days before passenger service can begin.

With 35 million visitors a year to Las Vegas, Walker anticipates no trouble selling about 19 million tickets a year with automated ticketing at seven stations and remote terminals at hotels.