Crescent Stonewall Station

[Guest]

39 minutes ago, JBS said:

Not to get sidetracked on San Diego but their CC is still too small (it's been expanded previously and they have been fighting about expanding it/building a convadium for the last 10 years, driven largely by ComicCon and a need for a stadium for the Chargers).  As a 20 year resident of SD, I can confidently say that Charlotte will never be the convention draw that SD is for obvious reasons (weather, beaches, natural beauty, etc.).  That said, I've never seen a city do less with more than SD (and conversely, I personally think Charlotte is the antithesis, doing much with comparatively little).  I'd prefer visiting SD but I prefer living in Charlotte...

Steering this back to the topic, even without a massive hotel Crescent Stonewall will be transformative ( enough to avoid condemnation?).   

Yes I would say it'll be transformative enough. The answer I got from a developer friend was simply this. "Nobody is financing large hotels." So yea, the thing about needing subsidization is very on point. 

Back off topic for two seconds but maybe N. Tryon Innovation Corridor should be where we put the next big convention center. The Old Convention Center lasted from 1973 to 1995, 22 years. This one has gone from 1995 to 2016, 21 years and counting. Maybe its time for us to build our super convention center, and maybe it should go on the train tracks on N. Tryon. Build a 2 million sq foot behemoth and build hotels along N. Tryon and have it serviced by the Red Line. 

[HopHead]

1 hour ago, CLT2014 said:

As previously mentioned, both of these hotels are subsidized by local government to bring in convention business. Houston granted $138 million in development incentives to get the Marriott Marquis. Also, they have MUCH larger convention centers. Before we build huge convention center hotels with 1,000+ hotel rooms utilizing subsidies, we need the city to build a venue that can actually hold large conventions to fill those hotels. Our convention center is very small compared to most (and thus most of our conventions get by just fine with the hotels we have Uptown):

Charlotte vs. Peer City Convention Centers
San Diego: 2.6 million square feet
Denver: 2.2 million square feet
Houston: 1.8 million square feet
San Antonio: 1.6 million square feet
Portland: 1 million square feet
Austin: 881,000 square feet
Kansas City: 800,000 square feet
Cincinnati: 750,000 square feet
Tampa: 600,000 square feet
Raleigh: 500,000 square feet
Charlotte: 280,000 square feet
Sacramento: 135,000 square feet

To put things in perspective, San Diego's convention center is so big it would stretch from the Westin at College all the way down to the Sheraton/Le Meridian on McDowell if it was in Charlotte (essentially all of Brooklyn Village would be convention center space). That's the type of convention center that needs a ton of hotels. 

I really don't want to steer this off topic and turn this into an us vs them discussion, but where are you getting the info for this? I found it very hard to believe that Raleigh's convention center is that much bigger than Charlotte's. 280,000 sqft is exhibit space at the Charlotte convention center according to their web site (http://www.charlotteconventionctr.com/). The center is 850,000 sqft in size. According to Raleigh's convention center web site, they have 150,000 sqft of exhibit space (http://www.raleighconvention.com/about/facilities/exhibit-hall). I didn't easily find the size of their center. 

[UPNoDa]

^ So Roger Godell was right...we (Charlotte) simply don't have the infrastructure to land a Super Bowl 

[CLT2014]

8 minutes ago, HopHead said:

I really don't want to steer this off topic and turn this into an us vs them discussion, but where are you getting the info for this? I found it very hard to believe that Raleigh's convention center is that much bigger than Charlotte's. 280,000 sqft is exhibit space at the Charlotte convention center according to their web site (http://www.charlotteconventionctr.com/). The center is 850,000 sqft in size. According to Raleigh's convention center web site, they have 150,000 sqft of exhibit space (http://www.raleighconvention.com/about/facilities/exhibit-hall). I didn't easily find the size of their center. 

I was pulling from each convention center's website. Def messed up these two. Thank you for catching!!! I guess the overall point is that we don't have a very large convention center against cities like Portland, Denver, San Diego, Kansas City, Houston, etc... that have the capacity to host bigger events than us and probably need more hotel rooms. 

[Guest]

6 minutes ago, UPNoDa said:

^ So Roger Godell was right...we (Charlotte) simply don't have the infrastructure to land a Super Bowl 

Speaking that journalists ended up staying at a hotel where a murder ended up occurring during the DNC... and that had like 1/3 the attendees... no, no we definitely do not.

[deleted]

24 minutes ago, ricky_davis_fan_21 said:

Yes I would say it'll be transformative enough. The answer I got from a developer friend was simply this. "Nobody is financing large hotels." So yea, the thing about needing subsidization is very on point. 

Back off topic for two seconds but maybe N. Tryon Innovation Corridor should be where we put the next big convention center. The Old Convention Center lasted from 1973 to 1995, 22 years. This one has gone from 1995 to 2016, 21 years and counting. Maybe its time for us to build our super convention center, and maybe it should go on the train tracks on N. Tryon. Build a 2 million sq foot behemoth and build hotels along N. Tryon and have it serviced by the Red Line. 

I was actually referring to my post being enough on topic to avoid condemnation...I certainly hope no one would condemn Crescent even if there is some disappointment with the size of the hotel.  

Could we possibly fill a 2 million sq foot convention center (assuming HB2 issues are resolved)?  It feels like we're not quite ready for a center that is more than 2 times larger than the current facility.  I would like to think that you are right though...

Edited May 26, 2016 by JBS
based my question on a prior post...

[HopHead]

8 minutes ago, CLT2014 said:

I was pulling from each convention center's website. Def messed up these two. Thank you for catching!!! I guess the overall point is that we don't have a very large convention center against cities like Portland, Denver, San Diego, Kansas City, Houston, etc... that have the capacity to host bigger events than us and probably need more hotel rooms. 

Gotcha... Easy mistake to make I suppose. I would still be curious to see how many hotels those cities have in relation to convention center sqft. I still stand by the notion that we need one large hotel in the 800-1000 room range though, even though our convention center isn't as large as the others. What we have during the week alone is often filled out... My wife's sister travels here for business for one of the banks and most of the time has to book a room at the 2nd or 3rd option -- I've heard this from many other out of towners I know too. But as has been mentioned, it's not going to be easy to get the financing to build one unless the hotel is subsidized. 

Edited May 26, 2016 by HopHead

[HopHead]

20 minutes ago, UPNoDa said:

^ So Roger Godell was right...we (Charlotte) simply don't have the infrastructure to land a Super Bowl 

More hotel rooms can be built between now and 2022, when the next Super Bowl is available to bid. The stadium will always be the biggest issue IMO. Even with the improvements that have been made at BofA stadium, it doesn't come close in comparison to what the cities in the next 5 Super Bowls have. And that's fine IMO. I'd much rather win a Super Bowl than ever host one.

[cltbwimob]

As much as I would love to see a 1000+ room hotel, I do see why the local hotel lobby is against subsidizing such a hotel.  In all honesty I don't mind the fact that all our hotel development is in the small-medium category as much as I mind the lack of higher-caliber hotels coming online.  Obviously the two Kimptons, the purported Hotel Indigo, and Intercontinental will help, but I think we will still find ourselves severely lacking in the luxury/boutique hotel segment after all these come to fruition.  Many of the hotels coming online  in Uptown and Southpark are the types you can find at any exit on the interstate.  

In general, the lack of major brands such as Hyatt Regency, JW, etc is a real bummer for a city whose downtown is host to an amalgam of major Fortune 500 Financials and Energy companies.  It seems like, even with the hotel contracts already in place, that there would still be enough business to support a more robust luxury/full-service/boutique hotel segment.  More specific to Crescent Stonewall's case, initially the rumors centered around Loews and Cambria, so it was a massive letdown to see Home2 as one of the brands.  

[kermit]

2nd crane base (or is it for another pump?)

#craneporn

 

 

 

Edited May 29, 2016 by kermit

[CLTProductions]

2 hours ago, kermit said:

2nd crane base (or is it for another pump?)

#craneporn

 

 

 

Its a crane. The crane is going up next weekend (tentatively)

[kermit]

On 5/29/2016 at 8:07 PM, Jayvee said:

Its a crane. The crane is going up next weekend (tentatively)

2nd crane was going up today

[HopHead]

14 minutes ago, kermit said:

2nd crane was going up today

Image courtesy of our friend Ely on Twitter. And wow is that one busy area of town...

[urbanlover568]

I'm utterly amazed how much stonewall is transforming. Going on street-view is incredible to see the changes. 

[Higgs Boson]

Considering the amount of pedestrian activity this stretch of Stonewall will generate and the amount of buildings in Charlotte that are currently being renovated to have a better street presence, any chance the back of the convention center gets some sort of transformation?

[tozmervo]

I would actually love to see examples of convention centers that don't have terrible street presence.

[NYCLT]

1 hour ago, tozmervo said:

I would actually love to see examples of convention centers that don't have terrible street presence.

The Music City Center in Nashville is pretty awesome

[tozmervo]

12 minutes ago, NYCLT said:

The Music City Center in Nashville is pretty awesome

It's pretty and has some nice space facing downtown Nashville, but it still has what I would otherwise describe as dead elevations, urban wise. Just swap out Stonewall with Korean Veterans Blvd, and you're talking about the same problem.

[CLTProductions]

Denvers is pretty sweet but yeah overall convention centers are always dead space 

[Spartan]

On 5/25/2016 at 8:09 PM, KJHburg said:

The big new 1000 room  Houston Marriott Marquis with its Texas shaped pool is being subsidized by the city of Houston through all kinds of tax abatements and incentives. That is why we don't have a big hotel going up like that in Charlotte and remember the 700 room Westin was subsidized as well. Though our hotel growth is spread out I think it is a good mix the Kimpton, the Springhill Suites, the AC by Marriott/Residence Inn, Embassy Suites, and Home2Suites by Hilton and that is just want is under construction. Add into the mix the Grand Bohemian next to the Carillon building where they have purchased the land and we have  a great additions to the market. Our own hotel group locally does not like the idea of subsidizing a big new competitor and I don't blame them. 

I thought the Grand Bohemian / Carillon hotel project fell through?

[KJHburg]

The Bohemian bought that land before the Carillon building was sold so while it may take a while to get started I would say it is active. 

[CLTProductions]

21 minutes ago, KJHburg said:

The Bohemian bought that land before the Carillon building was sold so while it may take a while to get started I would say it is active. 

It's still active and not even behind schedule. They planned to get things going in fall of this year

[urbanlover568]

Incredible the difference. 

[Synopsis101]

[GeauxCLT]