The Wind Creek Bethlehem (formerly Sands Casino Resort Bethlehem) is a

casino hotel A casino hotel is an establishment consisting of a casino with temporary lodging provided in an on-premises hotel. Customers receive the benefits of both gambling facilities and lodging. Since the casino and hotel are located on the same premis ...

located in the Bethlehem Works development site in

Bethlehem, Pennsylvania Bethlehem is a city in Northampton and Lehigh Counties in the Lehigh Valley region of eastern Pennsylvania, United States. As of the 2020 census, Bethlehem had a total population of 75,781. Of this, 55,639 were in Northampton County and 19, ...

, in the

Lehigh Valley The Lehigh Valley (), known colloquially as The Valley, is a geographic region formed by the Lehigh River in Lehigh County and Northampton County in eastern Pennsylvania. It is a component valley of the Great Appalachian Valley bound to the no ...

region of eastern

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

. It is owned and operated by Wind Creek Hospitality, an entity of the

Poarch Band of Creek Indians The Poarch Band of Creek Indians ( ;) are a federally recognized tribe of Native Americans in Alabama. Speaking the Muscogee language, they were formerly known as the Creek Nation East of the Mississippi. They are located mostly in Escambia Co ...

History

The property is one of five stand-alone casinos that was awarded a slots license by the

Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board The Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board is a governmental agency of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, founded in 2004 as the state licensing and the regulatory agency responsible for overseeing slot machines and casino gambling in the state. The ...

on December 20, 2006. It was developed by the

Las Vegas Sands Las Vegas Sands Corporation is an American casino and resort company with corporate headquarters in Paradise, Nevada, United States. Its corporate mission is to create "Integrated Resorts" which feature a combination of gambling, accommodation, ...

corporation. The casino was slated to open in July 2008, but demolition took longer than expected due to the heavy concrete foundations of the old steel building. Its opening was delayed until the second quarter of 2009. The first concrete for the complex, which is located on the former

Bethlehem Steel The Bethlehem Steel Corporation was an American steelmaking company headquartered in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. For most of the 20th century, it was one of the world's largest steel producing and shipbuilding companies. At the height of its succe ...

land on the south side of the city, was poured on November 15, 2007. It opened on May 22, 2009. While the Las Vegas Sands owned several properties, this was the only casino in the United States to carry the Sands brand in its name, since the original

Sands Hotel The Sands Hotel and Casino was a historic American hotel and casino on the Las Vegas Strip in Nevada, United States, that operated from 1952 to 1996. Designed by architect Wayne McAllister, with a prominent high sign, the Sands was the seventh ...

in Las Vegas was demolished and replaced with The Venetian, and the

Sands Atlantic City Sands Atlantic City was a casino and hotel that operated from August 13, 1980 until November 11, 2006 in Atlantic City, New Jersey. It was formerly known as the Brighton Hotel & Casino. It consisted of a 21-story hotel tower with 532 rooms and a ...

was closed and demolished. In the winter of 2009–2010, the casino was granted a license for table games which allowed the casino to expand to include 180 table games, including

poker Poker is a family of comparing card games in which players wager over which hand is best according to that specific game's rules. It is played worldwide, however in some places the rules may vary. While the earliest known form of the game w ...

blackjack Blackjack (formerly Black Jack and Vingt-Un) is a casino banking game. The most widely played casino banking game in the world, it uses decks of 52 cards and descends from a global family of casino banking games known as Twenty-One. This fami ...

and

craps Craps is a dice game in which players bet on the outcomes of the roll of a pair of dice. Players can wager money against each other (playing "street craps") or against a bank ("casino craps"). Because it requires little equipment, "street c ...

. Table games began operation on July 18, 2010. The Sands Hotel opened on May 27, 2011. Following the addition of table games, the casino has become a popular destination for

Asian Americans Asian Americans are Americans of Asian ancestry (including naturalized Americans who are immigrants from specific regions in Asia and descendants of such immigrants). Although this term had historically been used for all the indigenous people ...

from

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

, who frequently travel to the casino on motorcoach buses operated by

Chinatown bus lines Chinatown bus lines are discount intercity bus services, often operated by Chinese Americans. They have been established primarily in the Chinatown communities of the East Coast of the United States since 1998, and similar services operate on th ...

. More than 3,000 riders a day traveled by bus to the casino from Asian American neighborhoods in New York City. The casino has the busiest motorcoach business of any casino in Pennsylvania. Sands had offered $45 in free play vouchers for slot machines to riders who paid $15 for a bus ticket. This offer led to the creation of an underground market where Asian American bus riders from New York City, often low-income or homeless people, would sell their free play vouchers upon arriving at the casino and would loiter in Bethlehem for the day before returning by bus to New York City. Casino patrons would buy the free play vouchers in bulk at a discount and use them in the video poker machines, which have a lower house advantage, and attempt to make a profit. On March 31, 2014, in an effort to end this practice, the video poker machines at Sands stopped accepting the free play vouchers given to bus riders. It was the only property in the company to end 2014 with a profit, doing better than Sands' Vegas and Asia properties. In November 2016, a planned expansion of the gaming floor, along with two additional restaurants was announced. In March 2018, it was announced that the property would be sold to Wind Creek Hospitality for $1.3 billion. Wind Creek Hospitality had plans for a $190-million expansion to the property that would add a 300-room hotel and possibly an indoor water park. The sale was completed in May 2019, and the property was renamed as Wind Creek Bethlehem in July 2019. On June 10, 2020, Wind Creek Bethlehem was granted approval from the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board to offer

sports betting Sports betting is the activity of predicting sports results and placing a wager on the outcome. The frequency of sports bet upon varies by culture, with the vast majority of bets being placed on association football, American football, basket ...

. Construction of the

sportsbook In the United States, a sportsbook or a race and sports book (sometimes abbreviated as book) is a place where a gambler can wager on various sports competitions, including golf, football, basketball, baseball, ice hockey, soccer, horse racing, ...

at Wind Creek Bethlehem, which is operated by

Betfred Betfred is a bookmaker based in the United Kingdom, founded by Fred Done.Pronounced to rhyme with "bone". It was first established as a single betting shop in Ordsall, Salford, in 1967. Its turnover in 2004 was reported to be more than £3.5 bi ...

and located at the site of Buddy V's Ristorante, began around August 18, 2020 and opened on November 18, 2020. The casino resort temporarily closed from March to June 2020 and again from December 2020 to January 2021 due to the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identif ...

. Some games were made available online.

Wind Creek Event Center

Wind Creek Event Center was designed by Howard Kulp Architects of Salisbury Township. The event center features of flexible multipurpose space, which accommodates meetings, conventions, and a variety of entertainment events. The venue can house 3,800 in a general admission setting and 2,500 in a reserved seating setting. Operated by Vision Entertainment Group, it was opened on May 16, 2012 as the Sands Bethlehem Event Center, with a concert by

Incubus An incubus is a demon in male form in folklore that seeks to have sexual intercourse with sleeping women; the corresponding spirit in female form is called a succubus. In medieval Europe, union with an incubus was supposed by some to result in t ...

Janet Jackson Janet Damita Jo Jackson (born May 16, 1966) is an American singer, songwriter, actress, and dancer. She is noted for her innovative, socially conscious and sexually provocative records, as well as elaborate stage shows. Her sound and choreog ...

performed to a sold-out crowd at the venue in November 2017 for her

State of the World Tour The State of the World Tour was the eighth concert tour by American singer Janet Jackson. Launched in promotion of her eleventh studio album '' Unbreakable'' (2015), the tour is produced by Live Nation and is under the creative direction of Gil ...

Britney Spears Britney Jean Spears (born December 2, 1981) is an American singer. Often referred to as the " Princess of Pop", she is credited with influencing the revival of teen pop during the late 1990s and early 2000s. After appearing in stage productio ...

performed at the venue in July 2018 on her Britney: Piece of Me tour.

Facilities

Gaming

The casino features over 3,000 slot machines, 200 table games, several electronic table games, and sports betting. Sands spent $26 million in 2009 to add 119 table games: 41 blackjack tables, four craps, four roulette, four three-card poker, fourteen mini-baccarat, four midi-baccarat, three pai gow poker, two pai gow tiles, one Big Six, two Let It Ride, two Caribbean stud, four Texas Hold'em Bonus, one Casino War, one sic bo and 12 poker tables. Later a 30-table poker room was built off of the main floor. Table games began operation on July 18, 2010. The sportsbook at Wind Creek Bethlehem, which is operated by

and opened on November 18, 2020, has 79 TV screens, 13 self-serve sports betting kiosks, and 8 teller windows. Wind Creek Bethlehem also offers online sports betting.

Dining

*Burgers and More by Emeril * Carlo's Bake Shop *Chopstick *Croissanterie * Emeril's Chop House *Steelworks Buffet & Grill *The Market Gourmet Express Food Court, currently including: **Bananas **Casa Java **Far East **GreenLeafs **Mo Burger **South Philly Steaks & Fries **Villa Italian Kitchen

Nightlife

*Molten *Coil Lounge *Vision Bar

Shopping

The Outlets at Wind Creek Bethlehem The Outlets at Wind Creek Bethlehem (formerly The Shoppes at Sands and The Outlets at Sands Bethlehem) is an indoor shopping mall located inside the Wind Creek Bethlehem casino resort in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. It opened on November 1, 2011 and ...

is an indoor

shopping mall A shopping mall (or simply mall) is a North American term for a large indoor shopping center, usually anchored by department stores. The term "mall" originally meant a pedestrian promenade with shops along it (that is, the term was used to refe ...

that connects the casino and the hotel. The outlet center, which opened on November 1, 2011 and is located under the Minsi Trail Bridge, comprises of retail space and includes a

food court A food court (in Asia-Pacific also called food hall or hawker centre) is generally an indoor plaza or common area within a facility that is contiguous with the counters of multiple food vendors and provides a common area for self-serve dinner. I ...

, near the casino entrance.

Events

Lehigh Valley Food & Wine Festival

The hotel hosts the yearly Lehigh Valley Food & Wine Festival, held at the end of May/early June to benefit the culinary and hospitality program at

Northampton Community College Northampton Community College is a public community college in Pennsylvania with campuses in Bethlehem in Northampton County and Tannersville in Monroe County. The college, founded in 1967, also has satellite locations in the south side of Bet ...

References

External links

Official website
{{authority control Bethlehem, Pennsylvania Buildings and structures in Northampton County, Pennsylvania Casinos completed in 2009 Casino hotels Casinos in Pennsylvania Tourist attractions in Northampton County, Pennsylvania