Fremont Street Experience

Las Vegas, Nevada

Fremont Street, the original downtown Las Vegas "Glitter Gulch," has been blocked off from traffic and turned into a five-block pedestrian mall (and, at dusk, an occasional and fierce wind tunnel). It's lined on either side by extravagant, neon-fronted casinos and strip clubs, and infested with sidewalk performers and lonely Christian missionaries.

In 2004 the whole thing was covered with a 90-foot-high canopy of more than two million electric lights, which after dusk turned into the Biggest Big Screen on the Planet. At intervals the neon along all five blocks would go dark while short animated "movies" with booming sound effects and music played above.

One early example involved a race of green aliens whose intergalactic starships invaded the Strip and were somehow overmatched by American fighter jets. The jets blew the alien mothership to bits and saved Las Vegas.

Thousands of people underneath stopped and stared, and the message was clear: You don't have to do anything, Mr. and Mrs. America, but you will be victorious.

In January 2020, after a year-long renovation, the Biggest Big Screen got even bigger, now covering 130,000 square feet with nearly 50 million LEDs. The video display is now so bright and sharp that it runs 24 hours a day.