Most of the marquee pieces promised for Legends at Sparks Marina never got built the way they were described.
The arena, the ballpark, the large convention center, the 1,000-room resort, the dinosaur-themed restaurant: none of them arrived.
What did get built is Outlets at Legends, a 421,000-square-foot open-air center beside Sparks Marina in Sparks, Nevada.
Scheels opened first, in September 2008, with 295,000 square feet, a 16,000-gallon saltwater aquarium, and a Ferris wheel inside. The promenade opened June 18, 2009, with 24 stores opening that day.
Then the churn started. Saks Off 5th, Michael Kors, Tommy Hilfiger and Best Buy all left.
A trampoline park went in above Nike. An RV dealership with six service bays opened on the edge of the property.
Legends Bay Casino finally opened in 2022 for $120 million, a fraction of the $800 million resort proposed 15 years earlier.
In July 2026, Alturas Capital Partners bought the center at 97 percent leased. This is what actually happened, phase by phase.
Before Outlets at Legends, the gravel pit that became Sparks Marina
For decades, the lake beside today's shops was Helms Pit.
Helms Construction pulled gravel out of it year after year, hauling away millions of tons until the floor of the pit sat 100 feet below the ground around it.
Sparks stretched its city limits around the quarry in 1980 and expected to take the property over by the late 1990s.
The plan was to fill the pit with 30 feet of water and build a park around it.
In January 1997 the Truckee River flooded and made that decision for everybody.
Water poured into Helms Pit and filled it far faster than any reclamation schedule intended.
The city kept the water. That December, Sparks named the area Sparks Marina Park and approved a plan for the district around the new shoreline.
On June 28, 1999, the council created Redevelopment Area No. 2, which took in the marina.
So Sparks had a new lake and a large empty tract beside a freeway interchange.
What RED Development promised in 2006
On March 20, 2006, the city approved the main development agreement for Legends at Sparks Marina, setting out who would build the roads and utilities and who would pay.
RED Development, a retail developer out of the Kansas City and Phoenix markets, had big plans for the east side of the lake, off Interstate 80 at Sparks Boulevard, four miles from downtown Reno.
Early descriptions put at least 800,000 square feet of retail inside a project costing as much as $400 million.
Within a year the public figure was $500 million, then $1 billion once the resort and later phases were counted.
Full buildout on paper reached two million square feet.
What was supposedly coming kept changing through 2006 and 2007.
A hotel-casino with 1,000 rooms. Convention space. An arena. A minor-league baseball stadium.
A dinosaur-themed restaurant connected to the man behind Rainforest Cafe. Olympia Gaming was named in 2006 as the casino developer.
The first mass-grading permit came in February 2007, and Scheels got its building permit that March.
The permit for the pedestrian mall followed in December 2007, with the credit markets already seizing up.
A Ferris wheel inside a sporting goods store
Scheels opened first, on September 27, 2008, and it opened big.
The store covered 295,000 square feet, the largest Scheels anywhere at the time, promoted as the world's largest all-sports store.
Inside were two 16,000-gallon aquariums, a Ferris wheel, sports simulators, and a cafe, along with departments for sporting goods, outdoor equipment, and footwear.
More than 500 people were hired for the opening. Target followed in time for the 2008 holidays. Other large-format stores came in 2009.
Both 2008 and 2009 get used as the mall's opening year, and they mean different things. 2008 is Scheels and Target around the edge of the property.
The outlet promenade in the middle, the part with the shops and the fountains, opened the following summer.
Q&D Construction handled the grading, the utilities, the building pads, and the internal roads, working to a schedule built around getting anchors trading before the holidays.
Crews prepared the Scheels pad in two weeks on extended shifts, and kept building while lenders cut construction credit and national chains started closing stores.
Opening day, June 18, 2009
Ribbon cutting at 10 a.m. on a Thursday. That morning 24 stores opened on top of five already trading, with another 16 expected by August 1.
The open-air center had a stated construction value of $120 million and was built to be walked.
Shops ran along an outdoor route broken up by fountains, outdoor fireplaces, seating, and planting.
The art was Nevada by way of pop culture: dueling cowboys standing among steel tumbleweeds, airplane sculptures drawn from the Reno National Championship Air Races, Lahontan cutthroat trout moving through a line of fountains.
A lit sign tower 25 feet tall marked the center.
The store list mixed outlet and regular retail. Saks Fifth Avenue Off 5th took 28,000 square feet, Best Buy 30,000.
Gap Outlet, Nike Factory Store, Adidas, Michael Kors, Vans, Skechers.
Olive Garden handled dinner on opening day. Fuddruckers, Grimaldi's, and Cadillac Ranch followed.
The forecasts were enormous: 700 jobs right away, 600,000 to 800,000 extra visitors a year, up to $600 million in annual taxable sales.
The visitor and sales forecasts assumed a district including the resort.
In summer 2010, three of the new stores closed as their parent companies cut costs.
Who paid for the roads shoppers drive in on
Public money built the roads shoppers drive in on. On July 23, 2007, Sparks created Tourism Improvement District No. 1.
State law let the city pledge as much as 75 percent of certain sales taxes collected inside that boundary to STAR bonds, short for Sales Tax Anticipated Revenue. [2]
Bonds sold or approved in 2008 and 2009 came to $159 million.
After reserves and issuance costs, $134 million was left for work that included roads, water lines, sewers, and storm drainage.
The objection was simple, and people around Reno-Sparks still make it.
When a chain closes a store across town and reopens at the marina, the same Nevada shoppers spend the same money in a different building.
Over six months in 2023, businesses inside the district put sales to nonresidents at between 7.3 and 8.6 percent a month.
Then the crash landed properly.
RED walked away from a $141 million private construction loan tied to the development and filed a notice of default on bond obligations.
The stores stayed open through all of it.
Sparks refinanced in 2016 and 2019, authorized up to $35 million more in September 2025, and still has to close the books by June 2028.
The $800 million resort that became a casino
In 2007, Olympia Gaming bought 14 acres from RED for a casino-resort-spa.
The published version ran $800 million: 1,000 rooms, convention space, a spa. Construction was supposed to start in 2008 and finish by 2010.
The recession stopped it. Olympia kept the land, won approval for a revised hotel-casino in 2010, then waited on financing.
The plan shrank in public, one number at a time. $500 million. Then $350 million. Then $120 million.
While the parcel sat, Olympia built two hotels nearby, a Hampton Inn & Suites and a Residence Inn by Marriott, each with more than 100 rooms.
They gave the outlet center overnight customers years before any gaming floor opened.
The planning commission approved casino elevations on June 2, 2016. Then the pandemic pushed it again.
Ground was broken on March 31, 2021, 15 years after the original agreement.
Legends Bay Casino opened at 8 p.m. on August 30, 2022: 80,000 square feet, a gaming floor of 40,000, 660 slot machines, 10 table games, a Circa Sports book, and 300 jobs.
It was Northern Nevada's first ground-up casino in more than 20 years. No hotel tower.
Best Buy left and a trampoline park moved in
In April 2019, Best Buy decided against renewing its lease.
The store closed on November 2 that year after 10 years, leaving a 30,000-square-foot box on a property built around name-brand retail.
Plenty of the 2009 roster went the same way.
By 2026 the directory no longer listed Saks Off 5th, Michael Kors, Tommy Hilfiger, Nine West, or Fuddruckers.
The replacements came from other kinds of business entirely.
Galaxy Luxury+ IMAX opened on February 12, 2014, the only IMAX screen in Northern Nevada at the time, and gave the quiet end of the property a reason to be busy after the shops locked up.
It reopened on August 28, 2020 after the pandemic shutdown.
Burlington opened in 2018, 40,000 square feet of finished space built in 150 days.
DEFY put an indoor trampoline park above Nike in early 2019, and Paul Evert's RV Country added a showroom with six service bays.
The mix also picked up an acupuncture clinic, a yoga studio, a nail salon, and a coffeehouse.
By the mid-2020s the promenade still had Levi's, Nike, Vans, and Gap on it, plus a laser clinic and a brow bar.
Outlets at Legends in 2026
In July 2026, Alturas Capital Partners bought the 421,000-square-foot outlet and lifestyle center for more than $100 million.
It sold nearly full: 97 percent leased, more than 65 tenants, with H&M, Sephora, Five Below, Cavender's, and Galaxy Theatres among the names.
One vacancy was on the market, at 3,700 square feet.
The sale didn't include Scheels, Target, Lowe's, the casino, or the hotels, which is why the size of Legends depends on who's describing it.
Alturas bought the walkable middle. The district around it runs past 1.3 million square feet.
Somewhere between 12 million and 13.2 million visits land on that property in a year now. More than 430,000 people live within 10 miles of it.
Construction hasn't stopped.
A 109-room Home2 Suites by Hilton is going up at 1050 Scheels Drive, due in 2027, and Yard House missed its July 13 opening and moved into August.
Nearby residents have plenty of reasons to come. They come for dinner, a movie, a haircut, a run through Target, the walk around the lake next door.
Scheels alone pulls steady traffic that has nothing to do with outlet shopping.
Sources and further reading
- Outlets at Legends - Official Property Website - RED Development, accessed August 3, 2026. Provides the current official directory, address, and overview of shopping, dining, and entertainment at the center.
- Annual Comprehensive Financial Report, FY2017 - City of Sparks. Documents the creation of Redevelopment Area No. 2 and Tourism Improvement District No. 1, the sales-tax pledge available for STAR bonds, and the authorized use of proceeds for infrastructure and land improvements.
- Sparks City Council Minutes, April 2, 2008 - City of Sparks, April 2, 2008. Records the city's discussion of STAR bond financing, the planned arena, changes to the baseball proposal, the Scheels opening schedule, and projected later phases.
- City of Sparks and Redevelopment Agency Issued Debt - City of Sparks and Washoe County Debt Management Commission, May 16, 2025. Provides the outstanding principal and June 2028 maturity date for the refinanced senior sales-tax anticipation debt.
- The Sparks Marina: Past, Present, Future - KUNR Public Radio, October 8, 2015. Describes the site's history as Helms gravel pit and how the January 1997 flood rapidly created the body of water that became Sparks Marina.
- Reno-Sparks SCHEELS - SCHEELS, accessed August 3, 2026. Provides the store's September 2008 opening date, 295,000-square-foot size, indoor Ferris wheel, and 16,000-gallon saltwater aquarium.
- Legends at Sparks Marina Opening - Downtown Makeover, June 10, 2009. Records the June 18 grand opening, the initial store count, opening roster, public art, and visitor, employment, and taxable-sales forecasts published before the launch.
- Gaming Regulators Give Initial Approval to Legends Bay Casino in Sparks - The Nevada Independent, June 8, 2022. Traces the casino project's delays and declining budgets and reports the specifications, cost, employment, and gaming capacity of the completed proposal.
- Alturas Capital Acquires 421,000-Square-Foot Lifestyle Component of Legends at Sparks Marina in Nevada - Shopping Center Business, July 27, 2026. Reports the acquisition price, 421,000-square-foot area, 97 percent occupancy, and tenant count at the time of sale.
Current information last reviewed: August 3, 2026
Independent Publisher Notice
BestAttractions is an independent editorial publisher. We are not affiliated with, endorsed by, or acting on behalf of any location, business, property owner, manager, government agency, or organization described in this article.
Comments posted on this page are not forwarded to, reviewed by, or acted upon by any entity mentioned in the article.
For official inquiries, complaints, applications, bookings, or other requests, please contact the relevant entity directly through its official website or other verified channels.