The announcement was part of a picture of Atlantic City's future painted by speakers that, overall, appeared rosy, despite recent calamity on Wall Street.

Gov. Jon S. Corzine said resort development was well-positioned for future growth, afterward saying, "We think the kinds of projects that are on the table in Atlantic City are money-making projects."

He estimated the city annually puts about $1 billion in state coffers from taxes on gaming and related shore industries.

Corzine also said it was crucial that the proposed developments have enough financial underpinning to go forward in a financial environment far from normal.

But he said the resort would prosper in part because government regulation is stable and well established.

"People want to be in Atlantic City," Corzine said. "It's predictable, it's understandable, it's comprehensive, it's well-thought-through. Sometimes people gripe about it's too intrusive. The fact is people know how it works and they feel good about it and can make good decisions."

But in response to wider problems, Corzine announced that he called an emergency economic roundtable for Monday to see what ideas about could be found about improving the state economy.

Assemblyman Vince Polistina, R-Atlantic, who also attended, said Trenton should be a partner in Atlantic City, but said the state needed to fix its own problems first.

Curtis Bashaw, CEO of Cape Advisors, said the push to make a destination resort was a push to return to Atlantic City's historic roots as a place where people would stay for days.

The company recently opened The Chelsea that, with 2,700 rooms, is the first non-gaming hotel to open in the resort in more than a decade.

Bashaw said economic turmoil requires the city market itself better.

"The brand 'Atlantic City' needs to be reinforced in a way that dispels this media onslaught - oh, Atlantic City, oh, New Jersey - we always get the bad news, but we don't get the good news," Bashaw said.

Kevin DeSanctis, the CEO for Revel Entertainment, wowed attendees with a five-minute video that gave a computer-enhanced view of what the future held for their site in the Southeast Inlet.

He said it was still on track to open July 2010.

He praised local and state leaders for being endlessly helpful with the $2 billion project, a radical departure from a decade ago.

"Ten years ago that probably wasn't the environment in Atlantic City," DeSanctis said. "And I can tell you that a lot of people that I've worked for ... a lot of folks wouldn't go into Atlantic City because they didn't want to deal with the brain damage of working through the development process in Atlantic City. And I underline (those) words 'brain damage.'"

E-mail Derek Harper:

dharper@pressofac.com