So sometime in the 1950's someone through various means (bribes?) Gets Alice Springs an exemption from the licencing restrictions allowing 24hr boozing and gambling? Other vices are discretely catered to on the edge of town and more or less ignored by the police (also well compensated).
AHC Australia with a great desert city like Las Vegas
- Thread starter Malone
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Maybe if you had the Northern Territories have very lax gambling laws very early on, as well as some other industries, you might be able to make a sort of large city, but I don't know enough about Australia and its history as to why such a place might be created.
BlackDragon98
Banned
Another problem is population.
How many people do USA have compared to Australia?
How many people do USA have compared to Australia?
There is not enough water, when major cities have water restrictions and towns ship in water by trucks, it is just not possible, The Colorado is filled by melt water and rain from the Rockies, The Darling river is filled by sand and dead fish.
Yes, you're not going to get Sin City, the Great Red Centre can't support it, and Australian doesn't have the population. You can get Sin Town though.
When you look at the facilities, clearly there was money around in the 60s. I think they get hitting two directories which are always sliding in opposite directions.
1. you need fewer people to run the farms and mines thus less to run the support industries.
2. you need more people to justify "modern" niceties. I remember in the 90s it was a big deal coming in and hitting Roma because it had KFC, the first major fast food chain. That place made a mint. I am not even sure where the first cinema that wasn't a sheet on a wall was.
I think the thresholds are the size and permanence of the local industry. See a Mt Isa which services an area the size of medium countries.
And can the township act as a feeder for commuters to the capitals. Half of Victoria is in commuter range to Melbourne and so tree changers can revitalise a town.
Finally does the local industry still need people. Cairns need friendly faces to smile at tourists. Robots can't do that yet.
On topic, I seriously think one of the Territories is the best bet for an entertainment town. They are able to get some odd laws the stares can't. See fireworks. NT is too far away. Canberra still looks interesting being halfway between two population centres.
Fyshwick anecdote. Growing up in Joh's QLD, Fyshwick was a magical land of fireworks and full frontal pornography that travellers to Canberra would actually detour to to stock up on supplies and wares to resell upon returning home.
So there is a potential for an Australian sin city.
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If Western Australia leaves Australia in the 30s as a result of the referendum, would they be allowed to set their own laws on gambling, divorce, and other Vegas necessities or would the Commonwealth step in and forbid them from doing so? Although I think the problem would be that a natural "Vegas" center would probably be as close to South Australia as possible on the coast rather than in the desert, and Kalgoorlie isn't really close enough. Or even more likely further north in the country on a nice dry coast. I don't think you have a good equivalent to the Bradfield Scheme to give the city extra water either.
Actually, the Wrest Point Casino in Hobart was one of the earliest licensed casinos in Australia.
Doesn't meet the OP's inland/desert requirement.
Australia unfortunately suffered from an over-abundance of wowsers. The anti-gamblers, the temperance league, the anti-prostitutions leagues all existed in every Australian city and those cities were the seats of Government. Only in the major mining cities - Kalgaloori, Broken Hill, Mount Isa did such activities flourish and all were actually rather small enterprises compared to Las Vegas. Their were madams and there were Brothels but they were pretty localised. The major problem was lack of water. No water, no habitation in the numbers required to create a Las Vegas sized city. Kalgaloori was the biggest and it needed it's water piped in from Perth. Broken Hill was isolated, out in the far west of NSW. Mt. Isa was smaller and isolated out in the west of Queensland.
The Bradfield Scheme was never going to work. Bradfield based his calculations on British river flows and the rate of evaporation was much, much, higher in Queensland, even before you got over the Great Dividing Range. All you would end up with is a soggy marsh west of the Range and little water getting through to Lake Eyre. It would have been better if they dug a canal from Port Augusta, nothwards, through the Flinders, via Lake Torrens.
The Bradfield Scheme was never going to work. Bradfield based his calculations on British river flows and the rate of evaporation was much, much, higher in Queensland, even before you got over the Great Dividing Range. All you would end up with is a soggy marsh west of the Range and little water getting through to Lake Eyre. It would have been better if they dug a canal from Port Augusta, nothwards, through the Flinders, via Lake Torrens.
Isn’t Phoenix an even more notable example than Vegas of a great desert city? It’s something like 5th or 6th largest in the US and doesn’t have the same historical quirks of hookers, blackjack and Bugsy.
That's a good question. I view Vegas as more notable as it really does appear to be an isolated region. Nevada is more desolate overall than Arizona and likewise I feel Phoenix has less of that desert city feel being surrounded by other cities.
Riain
Banned
The Bradfield is a disaster waiting to happen, it seems to be getting a bit of airtime recently, I hope it goes away.
Las Vegas is not really in the middle of nowhere. It is 270 miles from Los Angeles, and indeed its post World War II boom was originally basically as a "satellite" of Los Angeles, providing southern Californians with pleasures like gambling that were illegal in their own state. It's not surprising that people from LA showbiz William R. Wilkerson - Wikipedia and the LA mob Bugsy Siegel - Wikipedia played a prominent role in the development of Las Vegas.
In short, it is not the equivalent of, say, a bigger Alice Springs--over 800 miles from both Darwin and Adelaide.
In short, it is not the equivalent of, say, a bigger Alice Springs--over 800 miles from both Darwin and Adelaide.
There really wasn't much south of the rim in az.. You had tuscon and the valley.. Scottsdale, Mesa, Tempe, Phoenix, Glendale sit on a natural aquifer, along with the salt River.That's a good question. I view Vegas as more notable as it really does appear to be an isolated region. Nevada is more desolate overall than Arizona and likewise I feel Phoenix has less of that desert city feel being surrounded by other cities.
Vbut really the population here was doa before AC,and lake please t and other reservoirs were created.
I mean it bloddy doesn't rain here, nor snow. Everything here can kill you.. It's AU in the USA... Granted vegas is seemingly isolated, but i reality it's not, Henderson, vegas are just over the boarder from Kingman and not far from the i40... Obviouslly tourisim is big as is gambling, but the area has been trying to also diversify.
Same with Phoenix that also has casinos, but is actually a major city (looking at it as McDowell to white tank Mt and South Mountain north to Anthem, it's a very large area.. Something near 160 km across and about 110 north south.
But water.. Heh.. This place is sand and cactus and if you go a little further south it's even more desolate.
Hoover damn was critical for Vegas and Arizona, but if I was gonna say a major city in a place one shouldn't exist.. I would say Phoenix and both Vegas qualify.
Also Vegas is an absolute textbook case on waste of resources
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That is thanks to Pauline and her band of village idiots. It will go away once a sensible engineer starts to look at the logistics of the enterprise. As I said, they'd be better off digging a canal from Port Augusta to Lake Eyrie, via Lake Torrens. There is only a hundred or so kilometres of land above sea level that way...