In one recent month, the hotel occupancy rate in Broward Countyclimbed to 67.2%, a jump of 6.7 percentage points over the likemonth of last year, while the average daily room rate reached$72.17, up 6.9% from the same 1999 period.

All this activity was in the midst of summer in super-hot SouthFlorida. However, recent figures indicate that the region's tourismseason now lasts 11 months of the year, with September the onlyreally slow month and October through Easter the peak period.

Lodging market vitality encouraged Interlink Hospitality Corp.of Dania Beach, FL to start construction of the 233-roomRenaissance Fort Lauderdale on the 17th Street Causeway just acrossfrom the 150,000-sf Broward County Convention Center. Mark Ellert,Interlink's president, describes his firm's $36 million ($154,506per room) project to GlobeSt.com as an "infill boutique hotel" thatwill include 12,000 sf of ballroom and meeting space plus extensiveon-site parking when it opens next spring.