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LOS ANGELES, CA - /Reuters/ - MGM Mirage's proposed new mega-resort in Atlantic City's up-and-coming Marina District will cost $1 billion to $1.5 billion, and will have a warm weather theme, CFO Jim Murren said on August 20.

Las Vegas-based MGM Mirage first disclosed its plans for the resort in 2000, saying the project would be on 50 acres of land next to the Borgata, its $1 billion joint venture with Boyd Gaming Corp. now under construction.

Since then, however, MGM Mirage has provided few details about the Atlantic City project on the New Jersey shore.

Speaking in a phone interview, Murren told Reuters the resort is expected to cost "toward the upper end'' of the $1 billion to $1.5 billion range.

Murren said the resort will create an environment that will be "comfortable and compelling'' throughout the year.

"That means you've got to bring a lot of energy and a lot of warmth and excitement inside to an area that's pretty raw in the winter,'' he said. "People are going to feel transported from the bracing weather of the East Coast in the winter.''

Murren also said that Renaissance Pointe would be the new name for land formerly known as the H Tract, where the Borgata and other new casino will be located. Both resorts are in Atlantic City's emerging Marina District, which is away from most of the older and smaller casinos in the traditional Boardwalk area. "We spent a lot of time on the name,'' Murren said.

"We kept coming back to Renaissance Pointe because of a variety of connotations. At minimum, it represents the rebirth of an area and in many respects...a rebirth of a city as well.''

Murren said more details on the resort would be announced by early next year. He added that MGM Mirage would like to open the property one to two years after the Borgata.

He said the new resort would not necessarily be bigger than the Borgata, which, with more than 2,000 rooms, will become Atlantic City's largest casino when it opens in 2003.

The two new casinos combined will significantly increase the number of hotel rooms in a city whose growth has been limited by a relative shortage of rooms. The city, home to 12 casinos, now has about 12,000 rooms, or a fraction of the 125,000 rooms in Las Vegas.