The northeast corner of Las Vegas Boulevard and Fremont Street has been transformed from a run-of-the-mill parking lot into a mini Burning Man with a purpose.
The Lyft Art Park is more than just an immersive experience; the space was created to alleviate congestion and confusion out of hailing a ride downtown.
“We don’t need parking lots, we need to get rid of parking lots downtown,” said Yacob Girma, Lyft Nevada general manager. “We did a pop-up during Life is Beautiful and we thought it was time to do a more permanent space.”
Vehicles don’t travel though the art park. Rather, rides are organized in an alleyway that runs adjacent to Fremont Street between the neighboring businesses and a parking lot behind The Ogden.
Rides are offered between 6 p.m. and 4 a.m. working around delivery times for the businesses.
Creating a central location to hail a ride in an area that is packed with people and vehicles, especially on weekends and special-event nights, the space serves as an easy spot to locate your ride, and provides a safety element, knowing that only Lyft vehicles are allowed in.
“We do thousands of rides per week just out of this lot on a weekly basis, so this area gets a little bit hectic,” Girma said. “So, there is a designated area where passengers know to go and we have a staging area for them and it makes the operation a lot smoother.”
The city backs the effort and will look at other ways to better serve patrons visiting downtown.
“The new area helps to centralize pickups and that is something that the city supports,” said Brandy Stanley, the parking services manager for Las Vegas. “In addition, we continue to study the curbside pickup issue downtown, and we are evaluating different technologies and solutions.”
Outfitted with multiple larger-than-life art pieces, visitors are instantly greeted by the 30-foot-tall ballerina statue made of 75 percent recycled materials called “Euterpe,” brought in after being displayed at the popular Burning Man festival that takes place in the Northern Nevada desert.
“The art at Burning Man, it’s really hard to show people that because it’s usually only at the festival,” Girma said. “It’s hard to move it and usually doesn’t fit in museums because it’s really large. So, the idea is to bring that art for people who usually don’t go to Burning Man.”
The ballerina statue is more than a stationary piece of art — it is moveable and programmable, performing four brief shows nightly. Visitors can move the statue’s limbs for added entertainment.
A cartoon pink taxi and a three-story Victorian house and other items join the ballerina, in addition to oversized games of chess and cornhole for people to play while they wait for their ride.
Plans are to change the main art pieces out routinely, with the towering ballerina to be swapped out with a 30-foot-tall polar bear next month. Made from recycled car hoods, the polar bear statue is a statement about climate change.
“That is something that we’re brainstorming now,” he said. “If this is going to be a long-term thing, how can we change it from time to time.”