Meeting News - September 8, 2008 - (Page 27)

By William Ng william.ng@nielsen.com Convention Centers in late July. “The stadium and expanded convention center complex will allow us to stack two citywides at the same time. We will have the amenities of a ‘Tier I’ city, priced at a ‘Tier II.’” The new stadium’s meetingsfriendly design is energizing convention prospects. With the Colts using the building just 13 percent of the time, according to Gahl, it was important that LOS be purpose-built for non-sports functions. One big selling point of the new stadium-convention center complex is its convenience. Especially in the winter months, Gahl noted that attendees will appreciate an underground walkway linking the expanded convention center with LOS. The walkway from the convention center, now under construction, leads directly to LOS’ two secondary exhibit halls (25,000 and 18,000 sf) and 12 meeting rooms (totaling 13,000 sf). The 140,000-sf field-level exhibition floor is divisible by two. Eleven loading docks are event-level to ease move-ins and outs, and the stadium’s wide pedestrian concourses and several club lounges can be used for receptions. The Marriott hotel complex also will be linked to the convention center via skywalk. The ICVA claims that in 2011, the center will be physically connected to 4,700 hotel rooms among 12 properties, the most out of all similar walkway-connected convention complexes in the country. All the properties are within a three-block radius, and the skywalks also lead to many restaurants and attractions downtown. “Once you’re downtown, there’s no need for a car,” said Dawna Money, ICVA’s director of convention sales. Meanwhile, across South Street, the convention center expansion will yield four new exhibit halls (“H” though “K,” totaling 240,000 sf, with “I” to be the center’s biggest, at 88,000 sf). There will also be 30 new meeting rooms. The finishing touch will be a stretch of the city’s Cultural Trail that will run along Capitol Avenue from the center to the new stadium. Started in 2007, Indianapolis’ ongoing $50-million Cultural Trail is an eight-mile collection of greenways with art installations and bicycle paths designed to link downtown to several outer neighborhoods. Altogether, Indianapolis’ civic projects represent more than $2 billion in investments that are intended to allow the city to challenge Chicago and other major convention destinations. r Lucas Oil Stadium Accelerates Indianapolis Off to the Races Like a pace car on the famous Indianapolis Motor Speedway, the long-awaited Aug. 16 opening of Lucas Oil Stadium officially marked the starting point for a cavalcade of downtown infrastructural changes designed to transform “the Racing Capital of the World” into a first-tier convention city. The 63,000-seat Lucas Oil Stadium—the new home of the NFL’s Colts—has added more than 180,000 sf of exhibition space to the city’s stock. Just as important, the LOS’ launch ushers out the old RCA Dome, which will be imploded to make way for a major expansion of the Indiana Convention Center set to debut in late 2010. Also transforming Indianapolis’ convention center package in a big way is Marriott International’s 1,600-room, four-hotel complex, which will begin rolling out in March 2010. Diagonally across the convention center, it is anchored by a 1,000-plus-room JW Marriott with a 40,000-sf ballroom and 105,000 total sf of meeting space. It will become the city’s biggest hotel upon its March 2011 launch. The JW will be preceded by Courtyard, Fairfield, and Springhill properties by a year. Meanwhile, Indianapolis’ new $1.1 billion airport, with two 20gate concourses, will debut on Nov. 11, shuttering the current facility, which has been in use for the last 40 years. “We’ve always heard comments about being in Chicago’s shadow,” said Chris Gahl, senior spokesperson for the Indianapolis Convention & Visitors Association, during a pre-opening hardhat tour of LOS held exclusively for MeetingNews www.meetingnews.com After ribbon-cutting, Colts fans wait to enter Lucas Oil Stadium for public stadium tour. September 8, 2008 MeetingNews 27 http://www.meetingnews.com

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Meeting News - September 8, 2008

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