Article on Detroit's Downtown Hotels

[Allan]

The inn crowd

What does the doubling of downtown hotel rooms portend for the long haul?

This hotel will offer 198 rooms. Does Detroit really need them? (Metro Times photo/Bruce Giffin)

Spurred in part by the 2006 Super Bowl, nearly 2,000 new hotel rooms are slated for construction in downtown Detroit, with another 600-plus under consideration. Such development begs questions, chief among them being whether the market can support the doubling of downtown rooms in the long term. And are the taxpayers at risk if the new hotels are not viable over time?

The Center for Urban Studies at Wayne State University pegs downtown hotel occupancy at 56 percent. That