Not all of the vendors are out-of-town vendors. Off the top of my head, I know of three – an art supply store in Little Italy, Mysterious Galaxy, and Bloodfire Studios. And I’m sure there are more.

And while there are a lot of locals who don’t get a hotel room (I’m one of them) or go out to restaurants, there are a lot who do get hotel rooms for the convience or go out to restaurants with friends they don’t get to see very often.

I understand that. But I’d hazard a guess that a vast majority of attendees don’t Amtrak to the convention. And, it would seem, that there’d be less price-gouging in Vegas since there are more available rooms and, possibly, lower airfares (based on what other posters are saying).

As far as local mass transit, there’s always the possibility of shuttles to the convention arranged for the convention. It wouldn’t be the first convention that had shuttle routes from several locations. NYC has plentiful mass transit, but the NYCC still has shuttles from various locations directly to the convention.

But I didn’t mean to be harsh or shoot down any reasons for not moving it to Vegas. I just think judging its potential for success in Vegas by several also-rans and their previous attempt isn’t a valid criticism. If this long established convention moved there, I’m pretty sure an overwhelming majority of the exhibitors would move with it. But any other reasons to suggest it isn’t a fine alternative are a completely different matter. :)

Another point I would like to make is that some of us people who commute to San Diego via LA like to use the Amtrak or Metrolink.

There is no amtrak to Las Vegas – nor any other train service to Las Vegas for that matter. IF AMTRAK were to get off it’s ass and not rely on government funding AND get that proposed BULLET TRAIN up and running then I’d almost be up for it..

But as it is – with the cost of airfare becoming increasingly high and riding greyhound buses with smelly bums and derelicts being the most suck ass way to travel ( I use a alternative busline called Megabus to go into town in order to have meetings with my printer – it is absolutely the champagne of buslines only because most derelicts and winos don’t know jack about making reservations on the internet) there is really not much hope for convention attendees who don’t own a automobile to attend a convention out in the middle of a desert.

And Las Vegas doesn’t really have that much going in as far as metro transportation goes – other than those double decker deuce bus that go up and down the strip.

~

Coat

I am NOT in favor of moving the Comic-Con to Vegas. IT IS TOO F***NG HOT THERE!

But I begin to despair over the city’s obvious hostility to the show,.

And if so, is it anyone with enough pull to guarantee that the cheap hotels in Vegas remain cheap the week of the Comicon?

My husband is an escapee of San Diego and he says it’s always struggled with little-town-looking-sophisticated issues. They want to bring in more ESRIs and downplay the gobs of money SDCC brings. Add to that the extra resources the city has to expend that weekend (extra cops, etc) and they start to look rather fondly at smaller groups of people with bigger expense accounts.

The City Officials don’t want to admit that a major portion of their economy is relying on funny books.

Spurge – I like the bluegrass idea!