Century Plaza / Convention Hotel rumoring (archive)

[mullen]

follow the news much? there's like 2 billion worth of development either happening or about to happen. a lot of shovels hitting the dirt downtown. there's constructiion going on everywhere.

there is reasoned debate about putting a glut of hotel rooms onto the market downtown and particularly about subsidizing them. people with decades of experience in the industry think it's a bad idea.

[trkaiser]

Carlson is already converting its Radisson Plaza downtown into a flagship Blu property.

[twincitizen]

I'm against corporate subsidies as much as anyone, but I think we all need to take a deep breath and think about what that means exactly in this case. There are some nuances here that I feel are getting brushed aside in favor of YES/NO arguments.

1. The site is currently owned by Hennepin County.
2. The site is currently paying zero property taxes.

There are two potential subsidies I could see happening here, neither of which are a direct taxpayer contribution (a la Vikings stadium). First of all, the site could be sold for an extremely discounted price. That would be a subsidy...sort of, but not really. I don't think anyone could come up with a real strong argument against that if it meant getting the property on the tax rolls. Secondly, the City/County could defer property taxes for X years in a TIF-type deal. Again, not a direct taxpayer contribution, but a subsidy nonetheless. I honestly don't think we're in any real danger of the City (taxpayers) making a direct financial contribution to this project. If that were the case, then yeah we should definitely protest.

The real question is if downtown Minneapolis needs a 1,000 room hotel, and to me the answer is clearly NO. The private market is building smaller hotels (Hampton by First Ave), perhaps a couple boutique historic bldg conversions, and doing all sorts of renovation. There's also hundreds of hotel rooms being added around the MOA. Taxpayer assistance (in any form, even those tolerable forms described above) would distort the market and give this hotel an unfair advantage over the investments being made without public assistance. If downtown needed 1,000 room hotel, the private market would be talking about building something with at least a few hundred rooms by now...but that clearly is not the case. The demand is not there.

[mnmike]

Yes, what twincitizen said! That is pretty much where I am on this at this point.

I have worked in hotels for many years...so yes, I know that obvioulsy the big conventions are looking to fit more than 1,000 rooms in one hotel and that is what we are trying to attract with this. Nobody has to explain that to me, I get it. We do, however, already have nearly 2,000 rooms in 4 hotels directly connected to the convention center via skyway, within one block of it, and that's not bad. Just the Hyatt and Hilton combined have nearly 1,500 rooms. The Hilton is over 800 as it stands...I wonder if they could find a way to expand by a few hundred rooms on their lot.

PS, by the way...The Hilton was our big subsidized controversial convention hotel when built...not sure if some people on here are not realizing that. That is why that 820 room monster was built in just after the opening of the convention center in the early 90s, so apparently these type of projects do get built here. Imagine that. 1000-1200 rooms is now the new magic number.

[FISHMANPET]

Just because other peer cities are doing it doesn't make it a good idea. I'd much rather we stop and analyze and present ourselves from making a bad decision than rushing in to something that won't pay off.

[min-chi-cbus]

Perhaps UnitedHealth's move downtown isn't so far-fetched.....afterall, they use a sale-leaseback approach to occupying buildings, meaning they may purchase the building but immediately sell it back to another party from whom they rent the space. However, most of the leases on their HQ buildings are 20 years, and the majority of the lease-end periods for the HQ are set to expire or have expired already, which is the impetus for a lot of that new construction you're seeing.

[min-chi-cbus]

Taxpayer assistance (in any form, even those tolerable forms described above) would distort the market and give this hotel an unfair advantage over the investments being made without public assistance.

This is your best point, and it's a great one!

[MN_RE]

A 1,000 room hotel would be a landmark and asset to the city for many reasons. The market is there: just between the proposed Hampton and Plymouth Building hotels, there are over 400 new rooms to soon be developed (this does not even include the handful of proposed mixed use projects that include hospitality components). I think downtown could easily absorb 1,000 rooms within 3 years which is how long it would probably take (from now) for a hotel to be completed and open its doors. Building new, generic and low-risk 200 room hotel every year (which seems to be how we keep up with demand) is fine but really does not do anything for the city. I would rather see the next five 200 rooms hotels combined into something substantial that will attract conventions, impact the skyline and create a wow factor. It seems a public-private partnership is required for something bigger. A brand new large hotel would complement our new stadiums well and really put downtown on the radar for large companies based in the suburbs (similar to the buzz that the stadiums and light rail have created).

[Minneboy]

I hope it has a water park. A observational sky needle/tower as well.

[min-chi-cbus]

I hope it has a water park. A observational sky needle/tower as well.

And a roller coaster looping around its top!

[nordeast homer]

With a beacon and a weather ball on the spire.

[Tyler]

We could call it the Kevin Beacon tower and project Footloose scenes onto exterior as decorative lighting.

[Didier]

With a Prince symbol as the antenna.

[David Greene]

We could call it the Kevin Beacon tower and project Footloose scenes onto exterior as decorative lighting.

Tremors.

[Minneboy]

Did I forget base jumping?

[City slicker]

Hahaha. Hey...Maybe Donald Trump will finance this convention center hotel? I could see a trump tower/hotel here in Minneapolis.

[BigIdeasGuy]

I've come around on this project. Not because I like the idea of subsidizing a massive hotel development that has a possibility of being a huge money maker, I don't like the idea at, but because of the statement it makes and the message it sends. It makes the statement that the Twin Cities is ambitious and we willing to compete with any city in America. It sends the message that we want to be considered a world class metropolitan area. And I think those are important messages for our region to send.

I should also make it clear that I would much prefer to subsidize the hotel in the way of tax breaks compared to a direct subsidy like the Vikings Stadium or the city/county owning the hotel. Basically allowing the hotel to only pay a percentage of it property tax bill each year and maybe allowing them to keep a percent or flat amount of the downtown hotel tax if needed. The city/county could get creative with the subsidy package and base part or all of on how successful the hotel is as well. As I said before I also think it is important for the city or county don't own or operate the hotel or take any part of the day to day operation, because that leaves to much exposure to the taxpayer IMO.

[ECtransplant]

It also sends the message we're willing to give private developers access to the city coffers

[nordeast homer]

It also sends the message we're willing to give private developers access to the city coffers

If the hotel is built on the county land and they offer any kind of TIF money there should really be no money coming from the city. Unless I am misunderstanding things, the county is not paying any taxes on the land right now, so we wouldn't be losing any revenue per se.
The city has done some stupid things with money in the past, (Block E, Conservatory), but I think this could be a good thing for the city. If Indianapolis can make itself a destination for events, there's no reason Minneapolis can't, and this would go a long ways to promoting that.

[contrast]

An interesting side note- there are currently 5 new hotels proposed in Bloomington totaling nearly 1,000 rooms. Three in the south loop near the MOA, one at PennAmerican, and the fifth near Normandale Lake. Recalling the prior discussion about absorption/demand and whether adding a 1,000 room hotel downtown would depress organic hotel growth downtown, I tended to agree with previous posts that adding 1,0000 rooms downtown seemed like a lot. But if Bloomington can add another 1,000 rooms right after adding the Radisson Blu, then downtown probably could absorb a 1,000 room convention hotel plus the Radisson Red, and other smaller proposed hotels too without killing organic growth. Just a thought- not a scientific analysis of market segments.