Salt Lake City: Official Development News Thread - Part 3 - Page 339

StevenF · #**6761** Posted **Feb 19, 2014, 5:56 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by wrendog

Wasn't sure what the Hive Pass, so I looked it up.

Nice 10 year old picture, official SLC website

http://www.slcgov.com/transitpass

There is a crane in that image building the Gateway West building and that opened in 98 if I remember correctly. looking more like 17-18 years old of a picture.

delts145 · #**6762** Posted **Feb 19, 2014, 12:10 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by jedikermit

...it's also been nice to hear the announcers/commentators giving Salt Lake City a shoutout every few minutes. Even something as simple as "their first games was in 2002 in Salt Lake City" is one more mention of SLC, in a positive context, reminding people that we're awesome, and our games were too.

Aaaand, I was in NYC for two weeks in January -- I was stuck in a hotel room for a few nights, and in virtually every commercial block, at least one of the commercials was for Park City. Which was kind of weird to see when you're out of town. But it was also gratifying.

Pretty much the same here in L.A., and from what I understand also the Chicago market. It's like millions of people can't escape the mantra of, "Where were you this morning?"

I remember when I first joined this forum, it seemed as if the majority of people on the internet were kind of oblivious to the beauty of Salt Lake's surroundings. Now it seems as if pretty much everyone is at least semi aware of Metro Salt Lake's proximity to incredible scenery.

Of interest to a lot of you would be this thread I happened upon the other day under the popular citydata forum. The title was, "America's Most Beautiful Cities." The only rule on the voting was you couldn't vote or express an opinion about your own city. I was pleasantly surprised as I combed through the many comments. Salt Lake was right up there with San Francisco and Seattle for the number of times it was mentioned as a favorite. The thread started way back some six years ago, and has continued on up to the present. You can tell by some of the comments that current projects like CCC hadn't yet been put in place.
Here's the link: http://www.city-data.com/forum/general-u-s/367293-americas-most-beautiful-cities.html

Any of you like Orlando or JTrent might want to comment from the perspective of your current hometowns. LOL, I guess technically any of you who don't live in Salt Lake City proper can politely play tourista.

Very excited about the announcement later today.

delts145 · #**6763** Posted **Feb 19, 2014, 2:19 PM**

House committee lends unanimous support to bill facilitating convention hotel

http://www.deseretnews.com/article/86559...-facilitating-convention-hotel.html?pg=2

It's been pretty obvious to all of us for a few years now that the 700 pound gorilla in the room opposing CCH is the Little America Properties. After reading this latest Deseret News article, the point is driven home again.
As a Salt Lake Downtown proponent I'm grateful that Little America came along at a time when Salt Lake needed a classy downtown hotel. Then again, Holding built the lavish Grand America before the Olympics, of which I am also very grateful. Let's be honest, the Grand America is head and shoulders above the majority of luxury hotels being put up these days, whether in Denver or Phoenix or Los Angeles etc. This is especially true for a Downtown Hotel. It's like a no holds barred extravagance that only the Vanderbilt's and the Astor's would dream up for New York in the late 1800's. Unlike much of what is in Vegas, I can actually knock my knuckles on the marble, and guess what, it's real! I spent a number of days at a luxury Ritz hotel recently. While very nice, it was nothing compared to the shear extravagant luxury of The Grand. The finish work on The Grand exterior and interior makes most Ritz and Four Seasons seem pretty average at best. However, I still get a little pissed at the way Holding INC. keeps trying to throw a crowbar in the spokes of the CCH. For whatever their excuse for building their luxury properties so far away from the Salt Palace itself, they have to now face the reality of their short sightedness. Yes, if they are able to continue to stall the CCH project as long as possible there is the possibility their profits will be higher short term. But that's short term. They need to face their wrong headed decision of location NOW. They've pushed back the CCH project long enough. Now is the time for the continued momentum and betterment of the Salt Lake CBD as a whole, particularly for the expanded retail and restaurant business of projects like CCC, Main Street and UPAC. For the survival and revival of Gateway, and it's future growth, we need the CCH NOW. Downtown Salt Lake City cannot only depend on it's up close location to it's mountains as a selling card over Downtown Denver and Downtown Phoenix. To really outpace the Denver and Phoenix CBD tourism, or now even farther away cities such as St. Louis, we need the Convention Center Hotel.

I also believe that true to form, Salt Lake City leaders will do like they have done with so many of their major projects lately. This Convention Center Hotel will serve as an icon that the State can be extremely proud of. Like the Library, The Rio Tinto, Public Safety Complex, Temple Square Campus, City Creek, and upcoming airport, etc. the CCH will go beyond utilitarian, unlike what we see with many of the new CCH Hotels, such as the Phoenix CCH and somewhat to a lesser degree with Denver's CCH design.

As Jedi and I have pointed out recently, the Salt Lake City area and Utah is as hot as hell on everyone's short list of tourism. You cannot turn on a television set in many of the major markets without being bombarded about Park City and Utah. It use to be I would have to explain Salt Lake City and it's resorts like Park City. Not any more. Everyone knows immediately what I'm talking about. Their facial recognition and comments are so obvious. This is true not with just L.A's West side Anglos, but also with the Latino, Asian and African American communities. The familiarity success that these ads are generating is only leading to more of the same for next year and beyond. As the CCH goes through several years of planning and construction, the other downtown hotels can maintain their current level of growth. However, what of those major conventions that are now bypassing Salt Lake City? Most have sincerely sited the lack of a specific CCH as their ONLY reason for passing SLC up at this time. Make the CCH official, and those mega conventions will start to line up with advance bookings in the very near here and now. And you can bet that Scott Beck, and all those that have pushed for the CCH for so long will boast to the high heavens every time a major first time convention books Salt Lake City.

wrendog · #**6764** Posted **Feb 19, 2014, 4:39 PM**

No leaks as to what this announcement might be? Coming up here in 1 hour 20 mins....

utenation · #**6765** Posted **Feb 19, 2014, 5:06 PM**

I'm simply amazed with the Sinclair(AKA Grand and Little America) organization. They simply want to prevent growth in SLC. They had every chance to develop a hotel closer to the Salt Palace and should have seen this coming. I'm in the boat of adding this hotel will just increase business for everyone with more overall business. The tax incentives are structured for tangible growth targets and efficiency that will benefit the state.

The Grand America has already established their brand and client base in SLC and as many know is a very nice hotel but it simply doesn't serve the purpose of a CCH.

As someone who goes to conventions around the USA, a CCH is a must, especially for a exibitor or a large company looking to have a company pow-wows. I work for a company that has 47000 employess and we recently had a huge kick off in Denver. The kick off had attendance of over 3000 employes and logistically, the Hyatt was perfect for our needs including overflow meeting room space-ballroom-dinners etc.. A nice combo with the Convention Center and a short 50 yard walk.. Imagine all the taxis-shuttles-cost involved for folks spread out over the city.. A CCH is a no brainer for a City that wants to be in the ballgame and wear big boy pants.

wong21fr · #**6766** Posted **Feb 19, 2014, 5:19 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by SLC Projects

9-0 vote. Nice. Looks like everybody's finally on board here. Hopefully the next step doesn't take too long and it will pass also.

More hints:
1."The bill also requires that hotel be built with at least 500,000 square feet of convention and meeting space and be located within 1,000 feet of the Salt Palace Convention Center."
2."The hotel could cost about $335 million, something no developer will build without government help, McAdams has said."

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2014/02/18/3944448/panel-oks-incentives-for-big-salt.html#storylink=cpy

500,000 sq ft of convention and meeting space in a hotel? That seems way too much space outside of the core hotel functions and certainly not for the projected capital cost. Now a minimum of 500,000 sq ft for the hotel in it's entirety seems more reasonable.

utenation · #**6767** Posted **Feb 19, 2014, 5:34 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by wong21fr

500,000 sq ft of convention and meeting space in a hotel? That seems way too much space outside of the core hotel functions and certainly not for the projected capital cost. Now a minimum of 500,000 sq ft for the hotel in it's entirety seems more reasonable.

Here is the exact wording from the proposed bill:

Quote:

240 (c) is located within 1,000 feet of a convention center that contains at least 500,000
241 square feet of convention, exhibit, and meeting space.
242 (14) "Qualified hotel owner" means a person who owns a qualified hotel.
243 (15) "Significant capital investment" means an amount of at least $200,000,000.

jedikermit · #**6768** Posted **Feb 19, 2014, 5:43 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by utenation

As someone who goes to conventions around the USA, a CCH is a must, especially for a exibitor or a large company looking to have a company pow-wows. I work for a company that has 47000 employess and we recently had a huge kick off in Denver. The kick off had attendance of over 3000 employes and logistically, the Hyatt was perfect for our needs including overflow meeting room space-ballroom-dinners etc.. A nice combo with the Convention Center and a short 50 yard walk.. Imagine all the taxis-shuttles-cost involved for folks spread out over the city.. A CCH is a no brainer for a City that wants to be in the ballgame and wear big boy pants.

I agree. I was in Denver at the Hyatt for a convention last year, and I believe I mentioned it at the time, but it's pretty much an ideal set up. It's a great hotel, the convention center was right across the street, and the (18th Street Mall/Pedestrian Zone thing?) was a short walk away. It was really a great time, and because of it and some other weeklong trips to Denver, I really love that city (despite the pissing contest between SLC and Denver here). It's a fine city with good infrastructure, and a worthy rival for us. We need to step up our game. And it sounds like we will be soon.

In marked contrast, I was in St Louis at their convention center/hotel last November, and it was a miserable experience. It was evidently planned as a sort of revitalization attempt, and is adjacent to their NFL stadium...but aside from the hotels, the convention center, and the stadium, there's a wasteland of several blocks around those amenities. Not much in the way of restaurants, bars, or anything else.

I love the synergy that could develop between the new CCH, City Creek Center, Abravanel Hall, and hopefully spread over to the Gateway and the restaurants and businesses along 100 and 200 South.

Hoping for the best (but as Plaid Shirts said, kind of expecting the worst).

jedikermit · #**6769** Posted **Feb 19, 2014, 5:44 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by utenation

Here is the exact wording from the proposed bill:

Is there any language in the bill about the number of rooms the hotel should have?

wong21fr · #**6770** Posted **Feb 19, 2014, 5:58 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by utenation

Here is the exact wording from the proposed bill:

Ah, so a journalist can't provide an accurate, comprehensive summary of the bill. Typical. Any proposed hotel has to provide a minimum of 85 sq ft of meeting space per guest room. So approximately 68K to 85K sq ft of space for the project. That's a lot more reasonable.

utenation · #**6771** Posted **Feb 19, 2014, 5:59 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by jedikermit

Is there any language in the bill about the number of rooms the hotel should have?

Here is the link Joscar provided. I didn't see anything on amount of rooms but then again, I didn't read the whole thing. Quite a bit of material..

http://le.utah.gov/~2014/bills/static/HB0356.html

Future Mayor · #**6772** Posted **Feb 19, 2014, 6:03 PM**

1,000' from the Salt Palace is something we all pretty much expected. At points where the Salt Palace goes right up to the sidewalk, the 1,000' is pretty much one entire block across the next street and a few feet of the next block. So basically we know it's going to end up being one of the following blocks, but I think we already knew that. Royal Wood Plaza, the 2002 Medal Plaza block, or the western half of the Plaza Hotel/Genealogical building block.

As for the convention space, that is easily accommodated on any of those blocks. The current amount of Exhibit space in the Salt Palace is is 515,000 square feet(large expo halls), 164,000 sq ft of meeting space, the Grand Ballroom at 45,000 sq ft, and 66 meeting rooms.

So basically the bill is saying, without specifically calling it by name, that the Salt Palace is the only convention center that qualifies for this legislation, because it has 500,000 sq ft of convention space. That is good language to have in the bill, because then other convention centers or hotels with convention space won't be trying to qualify.