Caesars Entertainment will bid on one of four gaming licences available in the US state of New York with the aim of building a $750m hotel-casino complex 50 miles north of Manhattan.

Caesars senior vice president Jan Jones Blackhurst said the casino giant has submitted a $1m application fee. The development is planned for a 120-acre parcel in Orange County, one of the destinations designated by Governor Andrew Cuomo.

Blackhurst said the development, which would include a hotel and casino with restaurants, retail amenities and an entertainment complex, would enhance the company’s current east coast operations, which include four casinos in Atlantic City and a racetrack casino near Philadelphia.

“This project would allow us to draw from the entire east coast,” Blackhurst said. “We have a strong east coast customer base.”

Caesars would lease the site from a New York real estate developer. The land is near a major train station and is a short distance from an outlet shopping centre that attracts 11 million visitors a year.