Hilton's luxury time share business unit last fall opened a 283-unit tower at the site.

The first tower cost $125 million, though Hilton hasn't estimated the eventual cost including the three additional towers.

"Our focus (in Las Vegas) will probably be on that site for the foreseeable future," a project that may take up to a decade to complete, Hilton President and Chief Executive Stephen Bollenbach said.

The tower complex will eventually surpass the company's two existing Las Vegas time shares, the 300 or so rooms at the Hilton Grand Vacations Club time share at the Flamingo resort and Hilton's 200-room time share tower at the Las Vegas Hilton. The towers, both built in the late 1990s, are among the largest in the company's system.

Bollenbach was in town this month to promote the grand opening of the time share tower. The Hilton time shares at the Las Vegas Hilton will continue to operate under Hilton after that resort is sold by Caesars Entertainment Inc. to private investment firm Colony Capital, said Bollenbach, who also serves as board chairman of Caesars Entertainment.

The tourism industry has rebounded nationwide and remains strong in Las Vegas, Bollenbach said.

"People across the (travel) industry are saying, 'There's a real turnaround here,' " Bollenbach said. "It's been a tough three years ... but I think we've felt things are going to get better."

"The general perception is that even the horror of 9-1-1 didn't really hurt our economy," he added. "It was brief and the economy is cyclical."

The improving economy has also been helped by the low cost of the dollar relative to European and Japanese currencies, which have made it more expensive for Americans to travel abroad, he said.

While hotel revenue was hurt in the wake of Sept. 11, the time share business remained healthy, he said.

"There's in-built growth in this business," he said.

Major hotel companies including Hilton, Starwood and Marriott have only become a force in the time share business in the last decade or so, raising the profile of the business and its appeal to buyers, he said.

Time shares are a popular alternative in spite of an increasing number of luxury condominiums now available in Las Vegas, he said.

Many Hilton Grand buyers exchange visits to Las Vegas for stays in other Hilton time share locations or in Hilton hotels worldwide through the company's frequent traveler program, he said.

"There's a huge amount of flexibility," he said.

For Hilton's time share business, Las Vegas has become a primary market because the company has built an effective sales force from the ground up, he said.

"It's a dynamic and important city and ... we've got a lot of experience there. A lot of our business is built around our sales force and we've built a really good sales force in Las Vegas."

Unlike some Las Vegas time shares, which are mostly sold from sales kiosks in resort hotels, Hilton sells most of its units through referrals from buyers and to people buying additional units from the company, Hilton spokesman Marc Grossman said.

"A lot of existing customers are buying additional units or weeks in those units," Grossman said.

Hilton entered the time share business in 1992 when it acquired a 50 percent interest in Orlando-based time share giant Grand Vacations Co. Hilton bought the remaining 50 percent interest in the company in 1996. The properties remain scattered across various communities, though several towers are concentrated in south Florida.

The company is in the process of opening its second Orlando time share. At the end of last year, it converted six floors of a Hilton hotel at the Hilton Hawaiian Village location in Honolulu into time shares. At the end of 2002, the company converted two floors of a Hilton hotel in New York to time shares.

Since the acquisition of Grand Vacations Co., Hilton has focused on developing a smaller number of bigger projects, Grossman said.

The company postponed construction of the North Strip time share tower by six months because of declines following Sept. 11. The timing of the opening remained on schedule, however, Bollenbach said.

Most of the company's time share customers in Las Vegas are from Southern California, while Japan is also a popular market, Grossman said.

"They're people who know Las Vegas and like Las Vegas and come to Las Vegas a lot," he said.

The 28-story tower at 2650 Las Vegas Boulevard is decorated in a "Desert Deco" design and features a fitness center, a poolside bar and grill, a deli and sundry store, picnic areas, table games and recreational programs for children. The property also accommodates nightly room reservations and group bookings as well as time share owners.

Hilton is one of the world's largest hotel companies and owns brands including Doubletree, Embassy Suites, Hampton Inn and Hilton Garden Inn. Of the company's more than 2,000 hotels, less than a dozen are Conrad properties. The company spun off its gaming operations in 1999 as Park Place Entertainment Corp., which changed its name in January to Caesars Entertainment Inc.

Liz Benston is a gaming writer for In Business Las Vegas and its sister publication, the Las Vegas Sun. She can be reached at (702) 259-4077 or by e-mail at benston@lasvegassun.com.