Waikīkī Beach lands spot on Monopoly board
Waikīkī Beach is one of the new squares in an modern version of the Monopoly board game, where the 22 national landmarks and their positions on the new board were chosen via an online poll. In Monopoly Here & Now, the prices have also been updated: Waikīkī Beach will now cost you $2.2 million, rather than $220, which is what the spot cost as Indiana Avenue. Landing on the space will cost you at least $180,000, or $10.5 million if there’s a hotel. Honolulu’s neighbors on the board are Disneyworld in Orlando and Camelback Mountain in Phoenix. Two other Hawai‘i locations were in the running — Kalākaua Avenue and Diamond Head — but Waikīkī Beach prevailed at the polls. Game maker Hasbro says over three million votes were cast this spring, and some cities took the contest more seriously than others. Phoenix Mayor Phil Gordon launched an e-mail campaign to encourage people to vote, and the city is now crowing about its success in leapfrogging over other locations and coming out ahead of cities like Atlanta, Denver, Houston, and St. Louis. Top spot Boardwalk has become New York City’s Times Square… much to the chagrin of Atlantic City residents.
Boston’s Fenway Park replaced the other high-rent spot, Park Place. Rounding out the pricier properties are the White House in Washington, D.C. (replacing Pennsylvania Ave.), Wrigley Field in Chicago (replacing North Carolina Ave.), and Las Vegas Blvd. (replacing Pacific Ave.).
The cheapest properties are Jacobs Field in Cleveland and Texas Stadium in Dallas.
The new edition has been updated in other ways as well. The quaint player pieces — a top hat, an iron, a dog — have been replaced by modern, branded versions: a Motorola cell phone, a Toyota Prius, a New Balance running shoe and a container of McDonald’s french fries.
Chance and Community Chest have also been modernized. Players can now discover, for example, that they were the runner-up in a reality TV show, or busted for identity theft or insider trading.
Monopoly Here & Now hit stores Thursday for a suggested retail price of $29.99.
