BRITAIN: Manchester was last night enjoying its victory after being named surprise choice for the UK's first Las Vegas-style "supercasino".
The Casino Advisory Panel's decision prompted dismay in Blackpool and Greenwich, previously the bookies' favourites to win.
Up to 1,250 unlimited jackpot gaming machines will be housed in the Sportcity complex in Beswick, east Manchester.
It will regenerate the deprived area, bringing some £265 million (€401 million) investment and up to 2,700 direct and indirect jobs.
But officials from Blackpool and representatives of the Millennium Dome in Greenwich expressed bitter disappointment at losing out.
Culture secretary Tessa Jowell will consider the panel's recommendations for the first supercasino and for another 16 smaller casinos before putting them to parliament for a vote.
Addressing the House of Commons yesterday, she insisted: "Las Vegas is not coming to Great Britain. British casinos will be subject to new controls which will be the strictest in the world.
"Las Vegas-style tricks of the trade will not be allowed. There will be no free alcohol to induce more gambling. There will be no pumped oxygen to keep players awake."
She said the creation of further casinos would not be considered during the term of the current parliament.
Critics fear the creation of the 17 new casinos will fuel a rise in gambling addiction.
Manchester's casino will be based close to the City of Manchester Stadium, now used by Manchester City FC and built for the Commonwealth Games.
Its arrival will prompt an upturn in the city's house prices, according to the Nationwide Building Society's chief economist, Fionnuala Earley.
Announcing its support for Manchester, the casino panel said it was "extremely impressed by the city's proposal, which offers great promise".
It rejected Blackpool, saying most of the supercasino's social benefits would be "exported" outside the seaside resort.
And it ruled out the Dome in Greenwich, saying it was not the best place to test the social impact of a supercasino.
The panel's chairman, Prof Stephen Crow, said: "Manchester has a catchment area for a casino second only to that of London, and it is an area in need of regeneration at least as much as any of the others we observed - indeed, the city has the greatest need in terms of multiple deprivation of all the proposals that were before us."