For years, the Portland Development Commission has been pushing to build a giant Headquarters Hotel next to the Convention Center, saying that “The lack of a HQ Hotel is the primary obstacle to attract more national/international conventions.” Today, the PDC got an updated cost estimate on the proposed four-star, 600 room hotel from Ashforth designs: $247 million, higher than any previous estimate.

The giant price tag is okay because this is a project which will solve EVERYTHING, according to the PDC. Here’s their list of benefits:
* $49 million estimated annual new expenditures by delegates, organizers and exhibitors
* $104 million in annual business sales; $1.4 billion over 20 years
* Approximately 1,500 new jobs created

The hotel operator, Starwood Hotels and Resorts, expects to make a $6.1 million profit the first year. At that rate, the hotel will soon pay back the public bonds Metro is expected to use to finance the project and Portland Eastside will be rolling in dough.

Unless… no one shows up, the Convention center remains cob-webbed and the hotel can’t maintain a 58% occupancy rate for its $150/night rooms. Then Metro and the public will be in the whole millions of dollars and we’ll have this ugly building on filling two blocks along MLK.

conventioncenterhotel.jpg

Ashforth designs exclusively glass and steel monoliths and the Convention Center Headquarters Hotel’s black and boxy design definitely relates better to the cars and pavement surrounding it than the overwhelmed pedestrian humans.

I’m skeptical of the rosy visions of a hotel saving the Convention Center — is the prospect of convention goers having to ride the Max for free across the river really the primary obstacle in attracting conventions to Portland? Public comments on the project accepted from now until October so weigh in at Metro.

Also: even if Metro doesn’t wind up approving the project in October, don’t worry! Large amounts of money will still be spent! The just-finished study to determine the project’s price tag cost Metro $600,000.

Sarah Shay Mirk reported on transportation, sex and gender issues, and politics at the Mercury from 2008-2013. They have gone on to make many things, including countless comics and several books.

8 replies on “Convention Center Hotel Price Tag: $250 million”

  2. Are we expecting the Convention Center to be a rip-roaring economic success on the same scale as, for example, the South Waterfront?

    How confident can we be in the economic forecasts?

  3. The problem isn’t a lack of convenient hotel space. The problem is that the area around the convention center is unsafe and poorly patrolled by Portland police, and the existing hotels are rundown and inadequately maintained.

  4. I think I recently heard that PDX police assigns patrols due to phone calls which is why the crack den that the Nest is on Alberta is still in business. The rich folk out in SW call the coppers twice as much.

    Man…that’s exactly the area of town I want the out of towners to view our city from. Nothing says stay the hell away from here than the convention center.

  5. There are also rent-a-cops patrolling the Lloyd District. I’m sure if this project goes ahead, their contract will be expanded.

  6. I can’t get the full text to open on my home computer, but if you take a look at the PDC page you’ll see that all their data is based on a 2006 “market report”; meaning this all sounded like a good idea back in 2004 when the economy was chugging along and gas was only $3 a pop.

    Even a lowly PCC drop out could figure that now, with the rising cost of travel, there’s going to be notable reductions in the size and scope of the Convention Market.

    I’m too caffeine deprived to look this up myself, but has anyone signed on to build this thing yet? And if so, what connections do they have to the PDC?

  7. The real problem is that Portland, while wonderful in many ways, is just not a convention city. It’s not a tourist destination a la San Diego, San Francisco, or Seattle, all on the West Coast, all on the actual ocean (ok, Seattle not exactly, but the bay counts), and all featuring airlines that get direct flights from just about anywhere. It’s much harder to get to Portland, and when you’re here there’s just not as much to do.

    I’m as big a Portland cheerleader as you can be, and I absolutely love it here, but we have to face the facts that we’re not a player on the major-convention-city circuit, and that the reasons for this are for the most part outside our control.

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