Sacramento Bee – The signs of decay linger on Virginia Street, the main casino corridor in “The Biggest Little City in the World.”

Pawn shops and cut-rate motels line up alongside the high-end hotel towers. The strip is still pocked with shuttered casinos, victims of the recession and burgeoning competition from Northern California’s Indian tribes.

But signs of comeback – slow and steady – are evident as well. Construction crews are turning the old Fitzgeralds casino, closed since 2008, into the outdoor-themed Whitney Peak Hotel. A small slot-machine parlor called Siri’s Casino soon will open next door.

In nearby Sparks, the Grand Sierra Resort is pouring $30 million into new amenities, including a chic $15 million nightclub. The new owners of the venerable John Ascuaga’s Nugget are spending $50 million on a honky-tonk entertainment venue, a new sports-betting operation and other upgrades. Closer to the California border, Boomtown Casino is putting $20 million into an overhaul.

Add it up, and Reno appears to be recharging. Nobody is predicting a return to the pre-2000 glory days, before full-fledged Indian casinos became legal in California. Instead, local leaders are working to reinvent the city as an all-encompassing travel destination; the Whitney Peak won’t have a casino.