“We’re happy that all of a sudden there’s this dialogue about gaming outside of Atlantic City,” Mr. Kirkos said.

For decades, there has been a political taboo against the expansion of casino gambling beyond Atlantic City for fear of undermining the 12 casinos there.

But Atlantic City casinos have been battered by the proliferation of casinos in surrounding states, especially Pennsylvania. Revenues have fallen by half since 2006. And now New York plans to license full-scale casinos within a short car ride of northern New Jersey and New York City.

So even as Atlantic City struggles to reinvent itself as a seaside resort and convention city that also happens to have gambling, some legislators, developers and gambling companies are looking to shore up New Jersey’s flanks against more competition.

“You’re losing four casinos in Atlantic City,” said Alan Woinski, publisher of Gaming Industry Weekly Report. “Why don’t you open a casino in another part of New Jersey? The customer in North Jersey is not going to Atlantic City anymore. They drive 70 minutes to Sands Bethlehem casino or to Yonkers.”

In July, Paul Fireman, the former chairman of Reebok International, proposed a $4.6 billion casino project with a 95-story skyscraper at the southern end of Jersey City, next to his 160-acre Liberty National Golf Course, a relatively remote location with spectacular views of Lower Manhattan.

Jersey City’s mayor, Steven M. Fulop, a supporter of the project, claimed that “it would be the highest-grossing casino in the United States.”