Phil Ruffin on his Park City entertainment mecca: ‘It’s gonna blow your mind’

As a billionaire businessman who already owns two popular, profitable casinos in Las Vegas, Phil Ruffin Sr. knows a thing or two about what brings in customers.

So even though his new Gilley’s entertainment complex in Park City only has pari-mutuel betting — it’s not a casino — he’s transformed his former greyhound park into an entertainment playground that he believes will attract adults and children from around the region.

“It’s gonna blow your mind,” Ruffin said. “Everybody’s going to be surprised at what we did at the track. It’s something that even Vegas hasn’t seen yet. It would compete very effectively on the Strip.”

The gambling hall, as Gilley’s is being billed, opens Monday with two types of betting, numerous bar and food options, a saloon, high-tech arcade games, pickleball, bar bowling, ax throwing, a roller-coaster simulator and an outdoor terrace and other areas available to rent for parties, among other uses .

In the spring, the Back 40, where the dog track used to be, will open for concerts, rodeos, food festivals, circuses, car shows, ice skating with a holiday festival, and other events that can accommodate up to 10,000 people.

Ruffin’s Treasure Island already has a Gilley’s Saloon, which is a saloon and restaurant only, and he owns Circus Circus in Las Vegas and Casino Miami in Florida. He also owns half of the Trump International Hotel with his good friend President Donald Trump.

He said he’s so impressed with how the Park City Gilley’s concept turned out that it has him thinking about possibly doing something similar in Las Vegas.

“That could be in our future, too,” he said. “We have all these new high-tech machines that Dave & Buster’s doesn’t have. . . . This is high-tech stuff.”

The first floor

After taking the 77th Street exit off of I-135 in Park City and heading east toward Hydraulic, the first indication you’ll see of a revived property — other than a massive Gilley’s sign — is a new fountain in a pond on the west side of the property.

After winding through a long drive, you’ll come to two entrances.

One is the main entrance with a large lobby that opens onto the Barrel & Bond bar and Gilley’s main attraction: 1,000 pari-mutuel machines, which Ruffin described as looking and feeling like slot machines.

These machines feature what is known as HHR betting, which is wagering on historical horse races. That means rather than randomly generated digits that slot machines have, these outcomes are based on random past horse races.

Another option is to enter a door just down from the main entrance that goes directly into the Gilley’s BBQ, Saloon & Honky Tonk.

If you walk to the saloon from the main lobby, you’ll pass a wall that’s designed for visitors to show off their belt buckles, similar to how some bars collect bills or bras from guests to display.

As one Gilley’s employee described it, it’s like taking a portal back in time to an old-fashioned barbecue and honky-tonk.

The restaurant has vintage and other cowboy-themed decor throughout, including a tin ceiling sourced from a Sedgwick County barn.

Behind the restaurant near a patio where guests can smoke, there is a permanent meat smoker . A portable one will sit out front once Gilley’s opens.

There’s a private dining room separate from the restaurant for high-end, curated dining that management wants to be a Michelin-level or James Beard-type experience.

The saloon is just west of the main restaurant, with a small mechanical bull-riding ring to greet guests, who can sit on chairs made of horse saddles to watch the action.

The venue seats just over 300, but its tables can be removed for larger shows to accommodate 700 people.

Acts including Colt Ford, Michael Austin, Locash, Aaron Tippin and others are already booked for this month.

There are premium booths along the front of the dance floor and wooden tables surrounding the sides.

“Gilley Girls” have been hired to lead line dancing and bring energy to the room.

Ruffin said he has the kind of wooden floor perfect for line dancing, which he learned about the hard way in Las Vegas.

“When they dance the line dances, they didn’t like the way the floor felt, so we had to put all brand-new floors in,” he said. “So we didn’t make that mistake this time. . . . We’ve learned a lot.”

Floors two and three

New escalators transport guests to the second and third floors.

As you step off the escalator to the second floor, there are glass doors and windows opening onto a large terrace that used to overlook the dog track.

Even in the cold, there’s something inviting about the large, sunny space with a variety of seating, fire pits and games, such as a human-size chess and checkerboard.

Guests will be able to rent the space for parties, weddings and corporate events.

Beyond that is the Back 40, which should debut by around May, and 10 Pig n Pickle pickleball courts on the west side of the Back 40 that should open sometime around March or April.

Back inside, there’s still obvious grandstand seating left from the dog track. One half of it now has high-end arcade games for all ages, and the other has cushy lounge seating facing the outdoors and walls of screens that will show sporting events.

Just back beyond the seating is the Gilley’s Trackside race book where guests can watch and bet on live horse-racing simulcasts.

Throughout all three floors, there are high-end finishes — even the bathrooms seem Vegas-like — and personal touches as well.

For instance, Ozzie’s bar by the race book is in homage to Ozzie, the stuffed rabbit that used to lure dogs around the track.

There’s an all-things-Kansas mural in the bowling area, with highlights of Kansas teams.

The bull downstairs is named Hightower after a character in “Urban Cowboy,” which was set at the Gilley’s in Pasadena, Texas.

Up another escalator is the third floor with the Golden Circle bar. The entire floor is dedicated to sports, with 190 feet of LED walls showing games.

On the east end of the floor is one room for private parties and another for ax throwing. To the west, there are four lanes of what’s known as bar bowling, which uses smaller balls than normal.

There’s also a roller-coaster simulator that takes two guests, who wear virtual-reality glasses to experience a ride that includes flipping upside down at one point.

There are golf simulators and other games as well.

Ruffin is particularly excited about the horse racing, which will have individual cubicles of sorts for personal viewing as well digital walls where projections of races will be so big, you’ll be able to see the jockeys’ shoes, he said.

“We’ll have beautiful screens out there,” Ruffin said. “It should be a nice draw for us.”

For the best

In 2007, Ruffin, his dog track staff, and friends and supporters gathered in what seemed like a cold, gray space at the old dog track to watch a countywide vote on a possible new casino for Wichita and slots at the track.

“I don’t know how it failed,” Ruffin said. “We were ahead all evening.”

It was so quiet in the cavernous 250,000-square-foot space after the loss, you could hear a proverbial pin drop since the lack of slots meant the end of dog racing, too.

“I was really hurt when we had to fire all those people,” Ruffin said. “That was really the thing about it. I didn’t need the money.”

Contrast that with the hub of activity that’s in the warm, bright Gilley’s environment of today.

Workers are putting finishing touches on every area, including squeegeeing ceilings, trimming massive Christmas trees, uncovering protective plastic on seating and machines, and doing practice runs with robots that will handle daily cleaning and serve some food and drinks.

There’s a hum of excitement and probably more than a bit of stress, too, as there is a lot to finish before Monday. That includes making sure a lot of technology works, including at the machines but also with sound systems and other electronics as well.

As disappointed as Ruffin was at the slots loss almost 20 years ago, and as bad as he felt for his employees, he said he now thinks it was all for the best.

Back then, he’d planned to open a Gilley’s entertainment venue not unlike the one he has at Treasure Island.

His new Gilley’s is much more than that.

Ruffin’s first Gilley’s was at his New Frontier Hotel and Casino before it was torn down.

“Yeah, that’s when I met Mickey (Gilley),” Ruffin said. “We were friends since 1997, and we became very close friends, and I liked him a lot. He liked me.”

Gilley used to fly to Wichita to have lunch with Ruffin.

Ruffin hopes to fly in Gilley’s widow, Cindy, for the opening Monday.

He wishes Gilley were here to see what he’s created.

“He would love it. He would go crazy. I’ve got a big sign — Gilley’s sign — up there. Maybe he can see it. I hope.”

This story was originally published December 11, 2025 at 2:52 PM.