Newham Town Hall
Westfield Stratford City shopping centre is now open for business following an official ceremony with the Mayor of London Boris Johnson this morning.
The centre has cost £1.45 billion to build and contains more than 300 shops, 70 different restaurants, a multi-screen cinema, three hotels and even a bowling alley. The new Westfield centre is next to the Olympic Park in London and has become Europe's largest urban shopping centre.
It's therefore fitting that Westfield is due to house the UK's largest casino. which is going to be built as an extension to the shopping centre. The plans in place are to build a casino classed as 'large' and are the first of their kind in the UK. The casino will be operated by Aspers who won the construction and operating contract amid some controversy.
Newham Council chose Aspers over Apollo Genting and City & Eastern who had planned to build the casino elsewhere in Newham. The two companies demanded judicial reviews following the decision but later dropped them claiming that they could not afford the costs.
Aspers have announced that they plan to open the casino in December 2011, but haven't revealed the number of slots and table games that will be available to players in the London casino.
