Nope. But to be honest, I work a “regular” Monday-Friday job, so the increased rake combined with the awful parking situation at peak times has kept me away.

Unfortunately it seems to be a late night game. It got going just as I was leaving last night and was still going when I got up for work this morning. I knew if I sat down today would be a rough day at work.

Parking situation: I went to the Encore on Wed after a month without visiting. It was striking how the parking situation was worse. I didn't expect it to be so full on a week day. Also, while the parking was full, the Encore looked empty...

Not sure how much it affects the parking situation but they have blocked off approximately 1/2 of the top level of the garage for VIP parking and it is always empty every time I've been there.

There a guaranteed space to park if staying there?

Garage fills up quickly on weekends and whenever there is an offer. Normally Wednesday is not busy, but complimentary blackjack tournament entries going on every Wednesday this month.

BTW, the Cantina is open until 4AM on weekends. After that, it's either Bru or Dunkin.

If you're planning to go today, there's a blender giveaway that will probably fill up the lot until 9PM.

what is the take on 2/2 and 5/5 plo?

Why is 1/3 of the available spots dedicated to the State Police? Are they expecting some sort of criminal incursion or are they trying to corner the law enforcement gaming market, or what?


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I think 2/2 is 10% max $6 and 5/5 is time $8/half hour?

That's a pretty long winded way to say "but Foxwoods has a Fuddruckers."

Yes, it's called the valet.

Honestly, I wish they'd kept parking paid but free with three hours of play.

Also, could anyone grab me a blender?

The casino has tried three parking policy variations so far: the original paid parking plan, free parking except on weekends, free parking every day. When they switched to free parking every day, one of the reasons they gave was because they wanted Encore to become known as gathering place, like for its restaurants and bars, not just as a casino. They want people to be able to pop in, patronize the myriad of mostly under-utilized pricey restaurants whose revenues aren't under special revenue-sharing taxes owed to the state (yes, adding a little of my own analysis here) and pop out, even if they don't gamble at all. They are calling the first 2 years their "ramp-up period," so I'm sure they'll eventually go with whatever gets them the best bottomline results.

Strictly from the consumer perspective though, is it better for us to have a parking lot where each spot taken won't turn over for at least 3 hours or a lot where the spots get taken up but can also turn over more quickly?

In the long run, my guess is that the lot with the latter policy eventually succumbs to the longterm players anyway. Imagine a McDonald's that shares a parking lot with a movie theatre but with way too few spots to support both. The fast food customers are in and out of the spots relatively fast while movie customers take at least 3 hours at a time (they're showing The Irishman). Each time a spot opens up, there's a chance it is taken by a movie customer who ties up that spot for hours. Eventually, all or most spots will probably wind up with a movie customer in it, as if the former policy was in effect. Again, that is my hypothesis. The root of the problem is that there simply aren't enough parking spots (unless people park off-property yadda yadda whole other can of worms; the fact that Rivergreen still charges extended stay [> 6 hrs] parkers drives me crazy when that off-property lot makes more sense as an extended stay solution because the shuttle ride each way takes about 20 minutes - that's 40 minutes spent for the roundtrip alone).

The other thing to consider is that this casino is admittedly trying to figure out the formula to get it more slot players (esp., daytime slot players), not exactly poker players.

I heard a rumor that the lot across the street would be owned by encore by the spring. Don't know if it's true or what they would do with it, but seems like it would be a good thing.

Nice. That should've been Day 1.

Final PSA, there's a number they give out on Twitter to check on current number of self-parking spaces. It's not automated and is answered by a human being. (857) 770-4370.

Almost all of the urban universities in the area have to hire outside parking consultants to optimize the price/schedule etc... and they do a pretty decent job of coming up with some kind of system. It seems from the staff that many of the executive decisions are from the very top (possibly Vegas even) and they're not in the trenches talking to players/customers. I am sure it is very complicated to figure these things out but there doesn't seem to be too much polling of the regulars.

My opinion is that the price/schedule is easy: parking should be free. Period.

* No casino in this region charges for parking.

* The Las Vegas Wynn and Encore stopped charging for parking BEFORE Boston Harbor opened. Boston Harbor still opened with parking fees. I don't blame them for testing if they could get away with doing something here in Boston that they already decided wasn't good in Las Vegas, but I knew before opening day that it wasn't going to fly here in the long run. I give them credit for being able to change policy quickly when they weren't getting their desired results.

* Their business is in mathematically rigged games. Some portion of the take from those games should go towards providing their consumers a nice experience. Part of that experience includes the parking. It's the first thing that happens when they arrive. It's the last thing that happens as they leave. I've said it here before, job #1 of the casino and its staff is to make losing money, and coming back again to lose more, feel okay. Asking for the extra bit of money for parking is very nickle and dime-ish, adds extra steps (hurdles) of administrivia for them to do as they're trying to head out the door after - mathematically more likely than not - losing $$$, and asks them for more money after they've - mathematically more likely than not - already lost as much money as they want to lose if not more.

* Consumers turning against fellow consumers over parking, at establishments mathematically designed to leech away their money, is just nuts. Giving away our money shouldn't become this unpleasant.

Any money they spend on studies should have been on studying how many free spaces for consumers they need to make the money they want to make and on how to get at least that number of free spaces. If they do acquire the lot across the street, that should help.

This is common with public traded companies in my two personal experiences. I've worked in an upper management (non-executive) roles where my VP would deliver my goals and initiatives along with a sense that he had nothing to do with these decisions (since would make no freakin sense for our market/store) which came from people who had never set foot in our store much less our regional market.

What do other parking garages in the Boston area charge? Celtics get $34 to park in their garage to attend a game. My wife works in Boston and pays $18 a day to park in their garage.

When patrons cannot find parking in the garage on nights or weekends when there are major sporting events going on in Boston they shouldn't complain about there being a VIP area, they should complain that all those people who are parking for free and taking an Uber to the Garden or Fenway taking their spots rather than spending up to $50 for event parking. I've done it twice myself and I know I'm not the only one.

Did any poker player ever really pay for parking anyway? So now instead of having parking validated we pay it in added rake.

I would say that the casino experience in, say, Las Vegas or Macau might be very loosely like going to a ball game, but not the casino experience in Boston. What I mean by that is that Las Vegas is a vacation hub. Most of the people going to Las Vegas casinos are treating themselves to a vacation, just like most people going to a ball game are treating themselves to a rare experience, so they can rationalize exorbitant parking at the ball park as part of that rare "treat" to themselves. It's not something they do on a routine basis, in other words.

Running a casino around here though is not about making a tourist trap, and I think the Encore is figuring that out. The casino experience here has to be catered to locals: steady, return customers. They won't do well here positioning their casino experience as a "rare treat." Therefore, simply carbon-copying the Las Vegas Wynn or the Las Vegas MGM and putting it in Everett or Springfield won't work. The customer makeup is just different. Casinos around here have to operate more like the Vegas off-strip casinos that the Las Vegas locals would actually frequent.

Generalities aside, specifically looking at the Garden and Fenway, they are both located in very busy residential areas. The Encore is not in any zone like that and used to be a toxic chemical dump in more of an industrial zone. The Encore shouldn't have the same problems as the Garden or Fenway. They should have purchased the lot across the street during development and put a multilevel parking structure there. I heard rumors that what they really covet is the Honda dealership, but, when that didn't come through, they should have pivoted. Now they're paying who knows what for a zillion shuttles and a parking lot (Rivergreen) that is farther time-wise than it looks and that people just don't want to use. Even people who park in the Rivergreen lot area opt to park on the street there first rather than in the lot itself, which I thought was pretty interesting and maybe goes to that $5 fee should they reach 6 hours.

If we frame this as poker players vs table game players or vs slot players, I think poker players are going to be the lowest priority. I don't think it's going to be a beneficial argument. The average blackjack player on a $25 6-5 table is probably donating around $45/hr to the casino, and that's the lowest offered blackjack game. It's possible that it's the lack of parking that they have to raise the rake in poker, because the parking spot taken up by the poker player could have been used by a more profitable profile player. Therefore they needed to raise the profit profile of poker players.

Anyway, again, I believe the casino needs to figure out how to get more free parking spots. The business model is literally people 1.) coming in and 2.) handing the business their money. There should be the least amount of friction for people to do these number ones and number twos. For #1, parking fees create friction; time minimums and play minimums create friction; lack of parking creates friction; the commute creates friction, ... Legalized online/app play would be a casino's wet dream, eliminating the need for #1 and getting straight to the #2s. Until then, they should just get more parking.

Agreed, Encore wants to make it as easy as possible for you to give them your money. Rhody was saying that he'll park at Encore and take an uber to Fenway. I'm sure a number of the spots are taken by people who aren't actually going to Encore at all, and just use it as a free parking garage. Someone at my table left their car there for a week while they went to the airport.

Having a small requirement to earn free parking is going to be preferable to the people who want to gamble. "Steady, return customers" are enticed by available parking, that is essentially free as long as you gamble a small amount. "Free" parking means nothing when it's not going to be available Fridays or Saturdays, and you have to park in the rivergreen lot or pay $20 to go across the street. That's hugely going to discourage repeat customers from coming and playing an hour of blackjack or slots. Ideally, yes Encore has tons of completely free parking (hopefully the rumor about the across the street lot pan out), but until that happens imo something should be done about people using the lot as a free garage with no intention of playing at Encore.

Ok, I see what you guys are saying now. Thanks for the explanation.

Unfortunately, every system is going to have a small outlier of people trying to game it, but basing policy on the outlier inconveniences the much greater whole. An example of this would be the TSA - and we know how everyone just loves the TSA - but their outliers would cause a lot more damage than some parking bandits so it can make sense in their case. I guess one must weigh the the potential damage on both ends and decide which is better on the whole. I haven't heard of a lot of people exploiting the parking, but, if it becomes commonplace, then I guess people can't have nice things and there'd have to be a crackdown via policy. I don't know what policy that could be. In your example, requiring a few hours of play to get a week of parking is still unlikely to discourage an exploiter from doing that trade.

It is typical for a professional sports team in a major metropolitan market to sell 50-70% of their tickets through season-ticket packages and the Celtics have a season-ticket wait list. For some, attending a game is a "rare treat" but this is not universally the case. You can't get safe, free parking anywhere in Boston on event nights. Maybe the play is to get these people to Uber back to Encore and continue their night with alcohol served until 4am but that would mostly occur on weekends. Either way, offering free parking is going to hurt the casino goer and/or poker player who would still get it free with validation.

Not to beat a dead horse, but I believe the overwhelming majority of people who go and park at the casino are there for some form of casino-related business. It could be to buy something from the Drugstore with their hard-earned compdollars, visiting a restaurant, redeem a promo (like picking up a blender or playing their "Hunt for $10,000" game where "everyone wins" [which just translates to a $5 coupon to Bru]), watching a performance, participating in one of their masterclasses or "experiences," staying at the hotel, going to the nightclub, playing table games, playing slots, playing poker, or any other thing that goes on at the casino. They are all valid reasons for being there, and none of these are more valid than another. Putting a minimum 3 hours of play for someone to come and redeem their compdollars or pick up their blender or play a game that mostly yields $5 for Bru or to toss in their "Winners Celebration" entries or to eat at a restaurant, etc. changes those offers altogether, doesn't it?

I guess they could re-enable the ticketing machines at the parking entrance, get that nice backlog of traffic trying to enter the casino while people fumble to get their ticket and wait for the gate to come up and down individually, validate the tickets for everybody doing any of the above, re-enable all the parket ticket payment machines again, get those nice backlogs of people waiting to go through the payment machines as people fumble around to find their tickets and (if applicable) payments, get those nice backlogs at the exits as people fumble around to scan their tickets and wait for the gates to go up and down individually, deal with the people stuck at the exit because they lost their ticket or forgot to pay or forgot to get validation - all because a small number of people might be exploiting the parking for non-casino business. But is it really enough of a problem to come to that solution?

How many parking spots do you think would be freed up by doing all of that anyway? How big, quantitatively, is this "parking for non-casino business" problem?

There is always the 1 compdollar valet parking option plus whatever dollars tip. That's practically free ... but it's not exactly free, and that's apparently enough for people to pass on it.

I know of people that live in apartment buildings and now park at Encore to save the $150-200 fee their building charges them every month. They just move it around in the garage a couple times a week hoping no one notices it. They also don’t have to worry about shoveling it out if it snows.

I think cal is underestimating the amount of people that only use Encore as a free parking garage.