Cordell Corp. to manage Las Vegas Convention Center renovation

The next phase of the expansion and renovation of the Las Vegas Convention Center took a big step forward Tuesday.

In a unanimous vote, the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority board of directors approved a $13.5 million contract with Cordell Corp. to handle the renovation portion of the seven-year, $1.4 billion project.

Cordell already is overseeing the current phase of the project, the $935.1 million expansion that includes building a 600,000-square-foot exhibition hall and three stories of meeting rooms at the northwest corner of Paradise Road and Convention Center Drive.

Convention Center planners haven’t pinpointed the exact cost of the renovation phase of the project, which will include connecting the North, Central and South halls with a common corridor and modernizing facilities with new technology. Initial budget plans released in May 2017 listed the renovation costs at $540 million.

The contracted price for the expansion came in about $75 million more than the initial estimate, in part through land acquisition that enabled the footprint of the project to be shifted 67 feet to the west providing more clearance for deliveries to the back of the house on the east side of the building.

Cordell principal and owner Terry Miller has served as the LVCVA’s builder representative on the expansion portion of the project, due to be completed by January 2021.

The renovation portion of the project will begin as soon as the new exhibition hall is completed. The project involves work on four existing exhibition halls, one every six months, with an expected completion by the end of 2022.

The LVCVA considers the work a three-phase project with the acquisition and demolition of the Riviera hotel-casino the first phase, the expansion the second and the renovation the third.

Miller told board members Tuesday that the expansion project is on schedule.

Miller said crews first had to relocate NV Energy power lines to trenches on the periphery of the project. They then removed all the asphalt from the parking lot and replaced it with fill dirt about 6 feet high to provide a level platform for the building’s construction.

A two-story visitor information center at Convention Center Drive and Paradise Road and a single-story building with restrooms were demolished and the connection to a pedestrian bridge over Paradise Road was left to be repurposed to connect to the new building.

Miller said the contractor is drilling 595 holes 3 feet in diameter and ranging from 40 to 70 feet deep. Rebar cages will be dropped into the holes, then filled with concrete to form a network of underground columns on which the building will rest.

Contact Richard N. Velotta at rvelotta@reviewjournal.com or 702-477-3893. Follow @RickVelotta on Twitter.