At the southeast corner of Rancho Drive and Lake Mead Boulevard, the drive-thru line now belongs to a Starbucks. Next door, Chipotle is serving customers in a new 90,750-square-foot retail center that Agora Realty finished building this summer on land that used to hold Texas Station. Across the way, at 2400 N. Rancho Dr., stands the one building from the casino era that was never torn down. It's the old Fiesta ice rink, and it's the one part of the site you can't skate in this winter.
The brand-new buildings opened first, and the old rink is last in line to get its ice back. It's being rebuilt to fit a 73-acre youth sports campus with groceries and burgers around it, so it runs on the campus's construction schedule instead of simply reopening the way it was.
The casinos came down and the rink stayed
Many North Las Vegas residents can trace this corner by memory, and the timeline matters because it explains why one building is still standing.
- March 2020. Texas Station and Fiesta Rancho closed and never reopened.
- July 2022. Station Casinos announced that both properties would be demolished and the land sold, as the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported.
- February 2023. The Review-Journal reported that Texas Station had been reduced to rubble.
- April 2023. Demolition was underway at Fiesta Rancho. Station said the attached ice rink was expected to stay.
- November 2023. The Vegas Golden Knights became the rink's operator in a partnership with Agora.
So the rink was always going to be the link between the old corner and the new one. It's the only piece of the site that people who grew up here have actually been inside. KTNV captured that when it walked the new center with a local who remembered the casinos' childcare arcade:
"My dad would take me and my brother to the Kids Quest. It kind of hurts, you know, but that's life. Things change. It looks beautiful; this building looks great."
That comes from KTNV's August report on Hylo Park South.
What you can actually use on the south side today
Hylo Park South sits on 11 acres and was 95% leased when construction wrapped in early August, according to the Review-Journal. Only two tenants were open at the time, though. The developer said the rest would be running by early 2027.
Open now
- Starbucks
- Chipotle
Signed and on the way, mostly in 2027
- Cardenas Markets, the grocery anchor
- Ross Dress for Less
- Sourdough & Co.
- Chase Bank
- PDS Health, AT&T, UPS and Allstate Insurance
- Tesla charging
- In-N-Out
Cardenas is the tenant that will add groceries to a center that today serves coffee and burritos. In-N-Out has the least certain timing. The chain paid nearly $4 million for a 1.2-acre parcel in July but didn't give a construction start date. It told the Review-Journal that its restaurants usually take eight or nine months to build once work begins. If you're waiting on a Double-Double, watch for groundbreaking, not the calendar.
Agora president Aaron Lefton described the center to KTNV as "a welcoming destination and community amenity for North Las Vegas residents." That's a fair description of where the south side is headed. For now, it's a coffee and lunch stop that's waiting for its grocery store.
The survivor has no ice this winter
Back to the rink. In May, Agora announced that what is now Hylo Park Arena had suffered a "major equipment failure." 8 News Now reported that upgrading the equipment would take about 12 to 14 months. Counting from that May announcement puts the earliest return to ice somewhere between May and July 2027, so it won't happen this holiday season. The Golden Knights, who run the building, said they would arrange ice time for local skaters at other rinks in the valley.
Agora is treating the closure as a reason to rebuild instead of just patching the equipment. According to the same 8 News Now report, the company had already spent more than $750,000 keeping the rink open and planned to invest another $1 million in expansion and new ice-making equipment. KTNV put the renovation at $2 million and said it adds nearly 5,000 square feet to the front of the building and expands second-floor seating. The plan includes:
- A new air-chiller system
- Seating for roughly 2,500 in the bleachers
- Upgrades already finished, including a new HVAC system, roof, scoreboards and granite finishes in the restrooms
The building isn't sitting empty, either. By late September, according to FOX5, an NBA-quality basketball floor had been laid temporarily over the ice and the arena was hosting youth games while construction continued around it. The arena is open again, just as a basketball gym on top of the ice instead of a rink.
Why the whole plan runs through a basketball floor
That temporary court is a preview of the bigger plan. On Oct. 1, the City of North Las Vegas announced that Agora had started construction on Hylo Park's third and final phase. It's a $375 million, 25-acre district built around a 250,000-square-foot indoor fieldhouse with a Robbins MVP Sports floor system. The district also includes:
- The existing multi-sport arena, which is the renovated rink building
- Game Changers Sports Academy, a college-preparatory school
- Outdoor public space and a community field
- Shops, restaurants and a family entertainment center
- A 177-key Hilton Embassy Suites
The city gives late 2027 as the completion target.
The city's reasoning comes from a park North Las Vegas residents already know. FOX5 reported that officials see Hylo Park as building on Craig Ranch Regional Park, which drew about 2 million visitors last year. Roughly 660,000 of them used its multi-use sports fields. Measured against Craig Ranch's total, that's about one visit in three that involved the sports fields. Hylo Park is meant to give more of that demand a home, and it adds a hotel so out-of-town teams can stay in the city instead of just playing there.
Part of that future is already on site. Game Changers Sports Academy had 52 students in September and had been operating at Hylo Park for about a year, according to the Review-Journal. Mayor Pamela Goynes-Brown described the local payoff at the unveiling: "North Las Vegas residents will be able to come here, see their children play, see their children achieve their goals and work hard and be dedicated."
Neighbors are filling in around it. Lennar is building The West End, a 373-lot mix of townhomes and single-family homes on nearly 36.5 acres along Rancho Drive at Coran Lane. Its plans include a central park area with an adventure trail and a play structure.
The corner's calendar, as it stands
| When | What to expect at Hylo Park |
|---|---|
| This winter | Starbucks and Chipotle open at Hylo Park South. Youth basketball on the temporary floor at the arena. No public ice. |
| Early 2027 | Most remaining Hylo Park South tenants, including Cardenas Markets, expected to be operating. |
| Mid-2027 | The rink's 12 to 14 month renovation window, counted from May 2026, closes. |
| Late 2027 | Target completion for the fieldhouse, Embassy Suites and the rest of the sports district. |
| No date yet | In-N-Out construction start. |
If you used to skate here on winter weekends, this is the year to go through the Golden Knights' other rinks. Check back when the renovation window closes next summer, and you'll be skating in a bigger, newer building on the same spot where the old casino-era rink has stood all along.
Corners like Rancho and Lake Mead change what nearby streets feel like day to day, and that's the kind of local detail Waylon Goebel follows closely across North Las Vegas. If you live near Hylo Park and want to know how the grocery, the rink and the 2027 sports district fit into your own plans, Waylon is glad to talk it through. Get in Touch.
