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Wedgeguy
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Re: Convention Center Hotel - (330 South 12th Street)

Postby Wedgeguy » October 22nd, 2013, 2:49 pm

I'll agree that it is still under review. That will move slowly while they try and figure out financing and future occupancy rates.

MS3

Re: Convention Center Hotel - (330 South 12th Street)

Postby MS3 » October 23rd, 2013, 6:57 pm

How much more studying and research is needed?! Build the hotel, stay competitive with other cities, attract events, and benefit Minneapolis. With all the money and time spent to do this research, we'd have the first 12 floors built and payed for by now.

Wedgeguy
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Re: Convention Center Hotel - (330 South 12th Street)

Postby Wedgeguy » October 23rd, 2013, 7:11 pm

I say that until the economy revives and we have a good handle on how much future convention use will be out there. I believe, and this is not gospel, but the convention business as a whole either stayed flat or shrank here in the US. This is not a regional but a country wide decrease. Why other cities are building is so they hope to have a better chance at landing those few big conventions. But it the conventions still go to Chicago, Orlando, or Vegas they still have those empty hotel rooms dragging their room rates down.

Right now the crystal ball is still very clouded as to what the future has in store for the convention industry as a whole. Until we have a stable US Congress and Senate to get the economy back on track, building a large convention hotel would be a crap shoot that has pretty good chance of the building going back to the lender and bankruptcy for the developer. This would not be a venture that I would want the city or state to guarantee to fly as you would be shelling out major tax dollars down the road for years to come.

This is all my opinion of having watch what happen thru the last 30 years and the ups and downs of the economy and recessions and the use of the convention center. Those with strong fact can dispute me with their facts that this is not the case.

kregger22

Re: Convention Center Hotel - (330 South 12th Street)

Postby kregger22 » October 28th, 2013, 12:40 pm

It's good the county is still studying this. In my estimation, they should probably study the pros and cons for another 5-7 years before forming a committee to study their results.

Unity77
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Re: Convention Center Hotel - (330 South 12th Street)

Postby Unity77 » October 28th, 2013, 1:27 pm

There are plans to build a 40-story, 1,680-room convention hotel in Seattle. The development will also include nine stories of of affordable housing as well as retail and restaurants. The hotel is expected to open in early 2017.

Initial rendering:
Image

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FISHMANPET
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Re: Convention Center Hotel - (330 South 12th Street)

Postby FISHMANPET » October 28th, 2013, 1:31 pm

What does the Minneapolis Convention center have for smaller meeting rooms? I know there's the big main hall, but that's not useful for a lot of conferences (like academic conferences, for example). Are we competitive in that area, or are we just going for car and boat shows?

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Re: Convention Center Hotel - (330 South 12th Street)

Postby FISHMANPET » October 28th, 2013, 1:36 pm

And what do you know, I did a little bit of research, and we have 87 meeting rooms, and they're all pretty flexible. I found a floorplan, which I thought was useful:
http://www.minneapolis.org/sites/defaul ... orplan.pdf

Wedgeguy
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Re: Convention Center Hotel - (330 South 12th Street)

Postby Wedgeguy » October 28th, 2013, 2:13 pm

Between the main halls and the street is are several series of flexible rooms on the first and second story of the building. There is a variety of space for small events to nationals conventions as is.

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Nick
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Re: Convention Center Hotel - (330 South 12th Street)

Postby Nick » October 28th, 2013, 3:49 pm

There are plans to build a 40-story, 1,680-room convention hotel in Seattle. The development will also include nine stories of of affordable housing as well as retail and restaurants. The hotel is expected to open in early 2017.

Initial rendering:
Image
Did a little bit of digging and this doesn't appear to be a slam dunk yet. Can't find anything recent about it on the Seattle Times website, but I know the search function on the Strib website is terrible and so the Times' might be also. Just throwing that out there before we see "but Seattle is building one!" as a reason that we should subsidize ours.
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John
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Re: Convention Center Hotel - (330 South 12th Street)

Postby John » October 28th, 2013, 4:48 pm

The Seattle hotel project has received some preliminary approvals from the city, however, there is a labor dispute with hospitality union workers slowing down the process. Ultimately this appears to moving forward, but will need approval by the city council to vacate some property for the development, according to this article:
http://www.bizjournals.com/seattle/news ... l?page=all

As far as the convention hotel here, I have not heard anything recently one way or another, but I think the idea is still alive. As far as public subsidy, again there are ways to do this which minimizes the risk to taxpayers and the city. Retiredbanker could better elaborate on this.

Unity77
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Re: Convention Center Hotel - (330 South 12th Street)

Postby Unity77 » October 28th, 2013, 6:23 pm

Did a little bit of digging and this doesn't appear to be a slam dunk yet. Can't find anything recent about it on the Seattle Times website, but I know the search function on the Strib website is terrible and so the Times' might be also. Just throwing that out there before we see "but Seattle is building one!" as a reason that we should subsidize ours.
Where in my post did I state that it's being built?

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Nick
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Re: Convention Center Hotel - (330 South 12th Street)

Postby Nick » October 28th, 2013, 6:58 pm

Didn't say that you did, but there was no link in your post and it seemed like an important clarification.
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writruth
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Re: Convention Center Hotel - (330 South 12th Street)

Postby writruth » October 28th, 2013, 7:21 pm

How is it that our so-called competitors such as Denver, Indianapolis, San Antonio, Seattle, can build these types of world class hospitality assets, swiftly and seemingly effortlessly, while even the most mundane Minneapolis development projects get bogged down in NIMBY and other myopic bureaucratic roadblocks? How are the self interests of other hotel owners in those other cities addressed and these projects still move forward to completion?

Then when the Super Bowls and major conventions go to Denver, Indianapolis, San Antonio and Seattle because they have the infrastructure, we are left to shake our heads and curse the wind and demand another study.

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Re: Convention Center Hotel - (330 South 12th Street)

Postby John » October 28th, 2013, 8:00 pm

Good questions Writruth! Sometimes I feel our prosperity makes people too smug and insular here. Our very strong economy is taken for granted and many people believe it will always be this way (which is a fallacy and dangerous attitude). The recent Vikings stadium is a perfect example of this with all the opposition to subsidizing this project saying it was corporate welfare and would not help our economy. Now all you have to do is look at the booming DTE to see the huge positive impact it is going to have on our city! My feeling is many of the same people who were hostile to the stadium will view the convention center hotel with a similar preconceived notion. Seems naive to me.
Last edited by John on October 28th, 2013, 8:41 pm, edited 1 time in total.

min-chi-cbus
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Re: Convention Center Hotel - (330 South 12th Street)

Postby min-chi-cbus » October 28th, 2013, 8:40 pm

It's called speculation, and we don't see nearly as much of it (if any), so we don't have the big ups and the major drops like the cities you listed do. Denver, for example, flags and fleets each and every market cycle.

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Re: Convention Center Hotel - (330 South 12th Street)

Postby FISHMANPET » October 28th, 2013, 9:18 pm

Good questions Writruth! Sometimes I feel our prosperity makes people too smug and insular here. Our very strong economy is taken for granted and many people believe it will always be this way (which is a fallacy and dangerous attitude). The recent Vikings stadium is a perfect example of this with all the opposition to subsidizing this project saying it was corporate welfare and would not help our economy. Now all you have to do is look at the booming DTE to see the huge positive impact it is going to have on our city! My feeling is many of the same people who were hostile to the stadium will view the convention center hotel with a similar preconceived notion. Seems naive to me.
Or there's those of us that wonder if we'd ever make that $150 million back in taxes from increased activity. As with stadium construction, because there are so many factors to consider, it's really hard to make an easy determination as to the benefits vs costs. I think it's pretty naive to assume that it will be a slam dunk based purely on gut feeling rather than some kind of fact based evidence.

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Re: Convention Center Hotel - (330 South 12th Street)

Postby mnmike » October 29th, 2013, 9:27 am

How is it that our so-called competitors such as Denver, Indianapolis, San Antonio, Seattle, can build these types of world class hospitality assets, swiftly and seemingly effortlessly, while even the most mundane Minneapolis development projects get bogged down in NIMBY and other myopic bureaucratic roadblocks? How are the self interests of other hotel owners in those other cities addressed and these projects still move forward to completion?

Then when the Super Bowls and major conventions go to Denver, Indianapolis, San Antonio and Seattle because they have the infrastructure, we are left to shake our heads and curse the wind and demand another study.
What makes you think these other cities build major projects effortlessly? The grass is always greener isn't it? I can't speak to all the places you mentioned, but I know that Denver struggled to get a convention center hotel off the ground for almost 10 years before the city decided to step in and develop one...and Seattle has at least as much bureaucracy in city hall and "NIMBYism"(since you brought that up) with regards to new development as Minneapolis and other places, if not more. Probably more actually. Serioulsy, try googling "Seattle Nimbys". It is also pretty much a guarantee that most, if not all of the places you mentioned have built these giant occupancy sucking hotels with huge subsidies...which brings us back around to the discussion here, and why these studies are necessary. Subsidies are usually not popular with residents in ANY city or state, I assure you there were debates. A current example is Portland, OR, where convention center hotel discussions have been ongoing for several years. A hotel finally seems to be moving forward, controversially, with 40% of the hotel paid for by the state.

http://www.oregonlive.com/front-porch/i ... tla_1.html
http://www.wweek.com/portland/article-2 ... hotel.html

Just because you see things under construction other places, don't assume it's been a breeze to get to that point. If you are actually interested in how the development process works/worked in these "competitor" cities, do some research before making broad, sweeping statements on the topic.

Anyway, I am still not really convinced a convention center hotel is a good idea...in quite a few cases, largely subsidized convention hotels in other markets have been failing. And that is all I have to say about that:)

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Re: Convention Center Hotel - (330 South 12th Street)

Postby zumf » October 29th, 2013, 12:26 pm

You can read this article from back in June, but it doesn't really swing opinion in any particular direction. A couple have failed, but then we're not St. Louis either...

http://www.bizjournals.com/twincities/p ... l?page=all

I think the best route is to try and work with a company that has some local interest in this matter, Carlson Companies, and have them do something big with minimal public support. Minneapolis is a little strapped for cash now, and the county needs to weigh in a little (meaning in cash). Carlson would probably work harder to make it successful than a company from out of state.

EDIT: The absolute best scenario is Carlson builds a new headquarters building next to the convention center and combines it with the hotel. When conventions aren't going on, the hotel can be used for company workers and visitors staying there reducing the need for it to be "profitable" in a consumer sense.

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Re: Convention Center Hotel - (330 South 12th Street)

Postby jaboyd1 » October 29th, 2013, 1:21 pm

How is it that our so-called competitors such as Denver, Indianapolis, San Antonio, Seattle, can build these types of world class hospitality assets, swiftly and seemingly effortlessly, while even the most mundane Minneapolis development projects get bogged down in NIMBY and other myopic bureaucratic roadblocks? How are the self interests of other hotel owners in those other cities addressed and these projects still move forward to completion?

Then when the Super Bowls and major conventions go to Denver, Indianapolis, San Antonio and Seattle because they have the infrastructure, we are left to shake our heads and curse the wind and demand another study.
What makes you think these other cities build major projects effortlessly? The grass is always greener isn't it? I can't speak to all the places you mentioned, but I know that Denver struggled to get a convention center hotel off the ground for almost 10 years before the city decided to step in and develop one...and Seattle has at least as much bureaucracy in city hall and "NIMBYism"(since you brought that up) with regards to new development as Minneapolis and other places, if not more. Probably more actually. Serioulsy, try googling "Seattle Nimbys". It is also pretty much a guarantee that most, if not all of the places you mentioned have built these giant occupancy sucking hotels with huge subsidies...which brings us back around to the discussion here, and why these studies are necessary. Subsidies are usually not popular with residents in ANY city or state, I assure you there were debates. A current example is Portland, OR, where convention center hotel discussions have been ongoing for several years. A hotel finally seems to be moving forward, controversially, with 40% of the hotel paid for by the state.

http://www.oregonlive.com/front-porch/i ... tla_1.html
http://www.wweek.com/portland/article-2 ... hotel.html

Just because you see things under construction other places, don't assume it's been a breeze to get to that point. If you are actually interested in how the development process works/worked in these "competitor" cities, do some research before making broad, sweeping statements on the topic.

Anyway, I am still not really convinced a convention center hotel is a good idea...in quite a few cases, largely subsidized convention hotels in other markets have been failing. And that is all I have to say about that:)
The one in Seattle is the only one that wouldn't be subsidized. In fact, affordable housing was actually included with it to get the city to approve an alley vacation. That being said, downtown Seattle is a much larger tourist destination than those other cities thanks to things like cruise traffic and pike place market. If the convention center was already subsidized, why handicap it by not allowing it to fully compete with other convention cities? It's not like this is St Louis, Cincinnati, or Columbus we are talking about. Minneapolis is healthy, wealthy, and growing. Not to mention the fact that it is a substantial regional hub more akin to somewhere like Seattle rather than those other cities. The hotel would be an enhancement, not a futile effort at polishing a turd.

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Re: Convention Center Hotel - (330 South 12th Street)

Postby writruth » October 30th, 2013, 11:06 pm

How is it that our so-called competitors such as Denver, Indianapolis, San Antonio, Seattle, can build these types of world class hospitality assets, swiftly and seemingly effortlessly, while even the most mundane Minneapolis development projects get bogged down in NIMBY and other myopic bureaucratic roadblocks? How are the self interests of other hotel owners in those other cities addressed and these projects still move forward to completion?

Then when the Super Bowls and major conventions go to Denver, Indianapolis, San Antonio and Seattle because they have the infrastructure, we are left to shake our heads and curse the wind and demand another study.
What makes you think these other cities build major projects effortlessly? The grass is always greener isn't it? I can't speak to all the places you mentioned, but I know that Denver struggled to get a convention center hotel off the ground for almost 10 years before the city decided to step in and develop one...and Seattle has at least as much bureaucracy in city hall and "NIMBYism"(since you brought that up) with regards to new development as Minneapolis and other places, if not more. Probably more actually. Serioulsy, try googling "Seattle Nimbys". It is also pretty much a guarantee that most, if not all of the places you mentioned have built these giant occupancy sucking hotels with huge subsidies...which brings us back around to the discussion here, and why these studies are necessary. Subsidies are usually not popular with residents in ANY city or state, I assure you there were debates. A current example is Portland, OR, where convention center hotel discussions have been ongoing for several years. A hotel finally seems to be moving forward, controversially, with 40% of the hotel paid for by the state.

http://www.oregonlive.com/front-porch/i ... tla_1.html
http://www.wweek.com/portland/article-2 ... hotel.html

Just because you see things under construction other places, don't assume it's been a breeze to get to that point. If you are actually interested in how the development process works/worked in these "competitor" cities, do some research before making broad, sweeping statements on the topic.

Anyway, I am still not really convinced a convention center hotel is a good idea...in quite a few cases, largely subsidized convention hotels in other markets have been failing. And that is all I have to say about that:)
The one in Seattle is the only one that wouldn't be subsidized. In fact, affordable housing was actually included with it to get the city to approve an alley vacation. That being said, downtown Seattle is a much larger tourist destination than those other cities thanks to things like cruise traffic and pike place market. If the convention center was already subsidized, why handicap it by not allowing it to fully compete with other convention cities? It's not like this is St Louis, Cincinnati, or Columbus we are talking about. Minneapolis is healthy, wealthy, and growing. Not to mention the fact that it is a substantial regional hub more akin to somewhere like Seattle rather than those other cities. The hotel would be an enhancement, not a futile effort at polishing a turd.
Ahh, yes, these other cities, like our's, have extensive debates over major developments but, unlike our's, they eventually, result in shovels hitting dirt and seemingly often, the projects are built.

In Minneapolis, there's been 30-plus years of debating the pros & cons about whether to build a 1,000-room hotel here. There have been numerous studies and ultimately nothing gets built. It took 40 years to get our lone LRT line operational. People love it. There's great demand for more lines and now after nearly a decade, the Central line will be opened next year. Now of course, after years of study, approval of county, federal and state money, and a years-long route-approval process, of course the buildout of the next two lines are back to the study phase -- for at least three months -- we are told. Even Baltimore, after a couple of years of debate, built their Inner Harbor convention hotel with subsidies a few years ago.

My question remains, how can Indy, San Antonio, Denver, Baltimore, Seattle, Portland -- our competitors -- overcome the resistance to mega-developments but we can rarely do so? They build. We analyze.

BTW: I love the prospect of Carlson Companies moving their headquarters to downtown Minneapolis and building a global flagship convention hotel. Would love to see it happen. Same goes for our state's largest company United Health but the prospects of either of them happening in the near future seem to be remote.


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