The funding package also gives increased incentives to hotel developers like Barron Collier Co. of Phoenix, which scrapped plans three years ago to build a hotel across Third Street from Civic Plaza after the Crowne Plaza Hotel, now the Wyndham Phoenix, successfully sued to stop city loan guarantees for its construction.
Expansion of the Civic Plaza, scheduled to begin in June 2004, will increase the total rentable space of downtown facilities from 302,000 sf to 940,000 sf, allowing Phoenix to market itself to 85% of all conventions.
"It puts us in the major leagues for conventions and meetings," Steve Moore, president and CEO of the Greater Phoenix Visitor and Convention Bureau tells GlobeSt.com. "It will bring as much as 250,000 more people to downtown Phoenix and will mean about $450 million more in additional spending to what we have now."
Moore said while the city's old convention center can handle about 50% of all conventions, many aren't interested in coming to Phoenix because the existing facility is outdated and not very competitive with convention centers in other cities. With an expanded convention center, he said, "we'll have a better product to offer."
The project, to be built in three phases, will begin with the construction of a new meeting facility on the Civic Plaza terrace, which will be followed by the replacement of the Civic Plaza north building. The third phase will involve the interior renovation of the south Civic Plaza building and will include a below-grade exhibition hall under Third Street, street-level ballroom and meeting rooms and two smaller exhibition halls on the top level. The project is slated to be completed by 2009.
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