Successful Meetings - November 2009 - (Page 124)

DALLAS > BIGGER & BETTER Bigger & By William Ng Better town, LEED Silver-certified property to have a local vibe. It will create an allday restaurant with the feel of a farmer’s market a half-block from the hotel, a lobby bar with a Dallas sports theme, and a spa and fitness center to round out amenities, says Tom Faust, Omni’s vice president of sales. Omni is also involved in a city plan to develop two acres around the hotel for mixed use, though there is currently no timeline. But Jones has revealed a $60 million refurbishment for the convention center’s meeting rooms, restrooms, and ballrooms that will debut by early 2012. Additional infrastructure developments around Dallas include the new, $354 million AT&T Performing Arts Center. The new, $1.3 billion Cowboys Stadium opened its doors this NFL season and is also giving the city an armada of off-site meeting spaces. In nearby Arlington, the retractable-dome stadium’s various club spaces support receptions and banquets for up to 2,500 attendees while the football field can host nearly 8,000 people. Even the team locker rooms are usable for groups. Still fluid are talks for a Dallas Area Rapid Transit (DART) light-rail line from DFW International Airport to the convention center. DART is in the midst of a 45-mile expansion involving new stations at Love Field Airport, Fair Park, and the hospital district (a boon for medical groups) by next year and a DFW Airport station by 2013. SM THE DALLAS AREA SAYS ‘GAME ON’ WITH AN HQ HOTEL ON THE WAY & NEW VENUES spirations for Dallas’ city-owned convention hotel are sky-high now that the decades-long vision is finally becoming a reality. The 1,016room Omni Dallas Convention Center Hotel broke ground in mid-September, and is slated to open in early 2012. Anti-hotel activists criticized the property as a taxpayer burden that would not succeed due to the country’s saturated convention infrastructure. But proponents, including the Dallas CVB and Mayor Tom Leppert, argued that scores of lucrative convention groups were being lost without an anchor hotel. The CVB and Omni Hotels say early numbers are proving there is demand. According to Omni, $3 million in group business has been booked and there is $51 million in the pipeline. Incoming groups include the Professional Convention Management Association next year, the Super Bowl in 2011, and the American Society of Association Executives’ 2012 annual meeting. “We want to reposition ourselves as a top-five convention destination in the U.S.,” says Phillip Jones, the CVB’s president and CEO. Dallas-based Omni wants its home- ESSENTIAL Tool Box CONVENTION CENTERS & FACILITIES Dallas Convention Center (726,726 sf of exhibit space); Grapevine Convention Center (23,500 sf of exhibit space) DAILY BUSINESS COSTS* Hotel $147.20, F&B $109.21, Car $114.97 FOR MORE INFORMATION www.fortworth.com www.grapevinetexasusa.com www.visitdallas.com READERS Recommend PINNACLE AWARDS GO TO: • • • • • • Fort Worth CVB The Adolphus, Dallas The Hilton Anatole, Dallas Hyatt Regency Dallas Omni Fort Worth Omni Mandalay Hotel at Las Colinas *Business Travel News 2009 Corporate Travel Index The Dallas skyline is set to change with the addition of a long-awaited convention center hotel I SM I November 2009 I SuccessfulMeetings.com http://www.fortworth.com http://www.grapevinetexasusa.com http://www.visitdallas.com http://www.SuccessfulMeetings.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Successful Meetings - November 2009

Successful Meetings - November 2009
Contents
Editor's Letter
Spain Hosts MITM Euromed
Meetings Law
Incentive Insights
Management Matters
Mouth For Sale
Golf Meetings
Corporate Social Responsibility
Places + Spaces
International Roundup
Paris
Hong Kong
Scotland
Colombia
Mexico
London
Copenhagen
Switzerland
Las Vegas
Dallas
Boston
Bermuda

Successful Meetings - November 2009

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