What Happens in Reston Stays In Reston

First floated earlier in the year, the idea of building a fun floating casino in Reston has returned with a vengeance, reportedly backed by some well-heeled developers. While there's been a bunch of handwringing that gambling isn't in the spirit of our plastic fantastic planned community, like that other affront to culture and civility (pickleball), we think Reston just needs to think bigger! After all, what does Vegas have that we don't?

The Sphere and the Luxor: Vegas has a rad pyramid and just opened a gi- ant globe-shaped concert hall, complete with graphics that can transform it into a creepy unblinking eyeball or emoji or whatnot. But that's so 10th grade geometry! Do they have buildings shaped like rhomboids and parallelograms? We think not, so grab your protractor and get ready to gamble!

The Fremont Street Experience: Vegas took the oldest part of town and added a bunch of fancy lights and whatnot to revitalize it. All we have to do is add a couple of tiki torches (and hot water), and the Lake Anne Experience will be golden!

The Loop: Elon Musk's fancy Vegas subway system wound up just being a couple of cars in a tunnel. We've already got a freaking SUPERTRAIN that can take you to Tysons or Ashburn, so advantage us. 

The Venetian: A resort replicating the best of Europe... almost. We've got a bunch of concrete abutments and play- grounds that resemble some of London's damper suburbs, so basically the same thing.

Treasure Island: Famed for having pirates act out a brutal sea battle on the half hour, this could easily be replicated by a reenactment of angry SUV drivers fighting for the last parking space on level G-27 of the Metro garage.

New York, New York: Back in the prehistoric days before Metro, people fretted that Reston was turning into "another Manhattan," so why not go all the way? Let's replace the bikeshare stations with ersatz hot dog and bootleg T-shirt vendors, and we'll be set.

Golf: Back when the Brat Pack (Google it, kids) was playing the big rooms in Vegas, many of the casinos had golf courses right on the Strip. They've all been redeveloped into 99-story hotels and condominiums so... uh, never mind, the end.

 This post was originally published in the Reston Letter.