Preparations are being made by MGM to build a new parking garage to accompany its $950 million Springfield casino.

To ready the roughly 14-acre development site, crews have been clearing the area for the first structure of the MGM project. This week, foundation work is expected to being on the 3,400 space, seven-level parking garage. The structure should take about 20 months to complete, with the hotel, casino, and entertainment complex slated to open toward the latter part of 2018.

MGM Resorts International’s project was one of three proposals for the Western Massachusetts casino license. In June 2014, the MGM Springfield officially received its license, and more than a year later in August of last year, the Gaming Commission voted to allow the casino to open. The decision by the Massachusetts Gaming Commission last month to reject Mass Gaming & Entertainment’s $677 million casino proposal, make the Mashpee Wampanoag’s $1 $1 billion First Light Resort & Casino the only game in Region C. Plans for the casino would have put it just 20 miles from the casino in Taunton being developed by the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe, which broke ground on April 5 and expects a partial opening by next year.

Meanwhile, three years after a plan to construct Las Vegas developer Steve Wynn’s $2 billion casino project was overwhelmingly approved by the residents in the Boston suburb of Everett, last week city officials issued the Wynn Boston Harbor Resort a building permit.