The 92-year-old downtown building that IBJ Media has occupied for nearly 20 years has been sold to the Drury Hotels chain. This just breaking from Indianapolis Busniess Jounal:
The four-story building at 41 E. Washington St. was owned by a group that includes IBJ Media co-owners Michael S. Maurer and Robert Schloss. The company, which publishes IBJ, The Indiana Lawyer and Court and Commercial Record, occupies the second floor. St. Louis-based Drury approached the ownership group—which includes Maurer’s son Todd Maurer—late last year about selling the building, which wasn't on the market. IBJ Media has occupied space since 1997 in the 65,000-square-foot building at the southwest corner of Washington and Pennsylvania streets. Other tenants include Morton’s Steakhouse, Hoosier State Press Association, Doyle Legal Corp. and Newmark Knight Frank Halakar. Todd Maurer is a principal at Newmark Knight. The sale of the property to Drury includes the adjacent surface lot to the west. Drury plans to convert the property to a hotel. A Drury official was not immediately available for comment on its plans. The hotel company plans to honor existing leases and won’t start converting the building and lot into a hotel for at least three years.
(So another hotel is now in the pipeline lets say Gen Con 2019- Randu)
The Drury Inn is a great hotel to stay at. I look forward to this opening up downtown.
Across the street from Scotty's is which sweet. Randu
Last October, the IBJ also had a story about other new hotel space being proposed: http://www.ibj.com/articles/55356-rising-occupancies-spur-downtown-hotel-building-boom
Drawback: The story notes that the trend is towards boutique hotels, and that "... all the hotels in the works would offer fewer than 200 rooms". So it's not night-and-day capacity change like the JW Marriott was when it went up. That said, if the Pan Am Plaza can ever get developed - and if it would ever get developed as a hotel instead of something else (link) - that could potentially be a real game changer (possibly a 500 to 800 room hotel, according to the IBJ link).
Well, as long as capacity is added, that's a good thing for us attendees. And enough of those smaller hotels can still make a real difference.
Before today there were five hotel in different phases of planning, this will now make it six. Now I doubt all six will be built but thems is pretty good odds. since most are building rehabs and conversions. We all await hearing on the next move regarding the next ICC expansion, which if history repeats itself for the 3rd time will include one or two major hotel projects. We have a new mayor and he's still settling in so it might be alittle while untill we hear something. Randu
Problem is, I don't think anyone knows yet how the ICC is going to expand. Yeah, we've both probably seen the same IBJ article discussing that (link), but that article makes clear the difficulties. Going to the Pan Am Plaza isn't exactly a slamdunk given the current existing business buildings there as well as the underground parking garage situation. And there's no way anyone would even want to dislodge Victory Field; that would backfire with all the ire such a move would generate. Building upward? I'm not sure the article really addressed the engineering challenges of that. North into the Convention Center Plaza? I don't know if you'd want to give up that green space, and again, there's an underground garage to worry about.
If I were in charge of the zoo :D I'd find a way to relocate the Citizens Thermal plant so that West Street didn't separate out into West and Missouri like it currently does. Then, there'd be some room to both expand southward and retain good loading dock space. Problem is, mine has also got to be the most expensive plan by a large margin: Relocating an entire power generating plant would not be an easy or cheap thing to do. And shutting it down isn't an option since it currently provides service for that part of downtown. Also, like the article mentioned: The railroad tracks are a problem.
This is why I'm not an urban planner. This isn't an easy problem to solve, not by a long shot. I really don't know how they'll do it. And I don't envy the poor souls tasked with figuring it out. :(
HA! Good one! :D
Problem is, typing "weaknesspays" over and over doesn't get me free money in real life. ;)
Once my new "Night's Sleep: The LARP" gets approved, we'll have a ballroom with 100+ cots. It's an 8 hour LARP, running from Midnight to 8am. Everyone gets a character sheet that says "Your goal is to get a good night's sleep without bothering anyone else."
So there's that plan too.
Oh that I am afraid your "Night's Sleep" The LARP" is doomed. It tried in 1978 as "Flop Space the RPG" at Univerity of Wis. Parkside and was ventured tried again cause of gamer funk. I confirmed this Frank Menzer several years ago, and he just looked at the floor and groaned. Randu
Well, Parkside was manky to begin with. A college dorm, and then you pack gamers into it? Early era gamers, who were more often than now hygienically challenged? I'm talking about a space in a hotel or the con center. So there will be cleaning staff! (I'm going to run Cleaning Staff, the LARP from 8am to Noon each morning as well.) And I'm going to offer SPA program walking tours of a local carwash.
College DORMS!!!!hahahahahaha The Flop Space was unused classrooms, the chumps at UWP didn't build dorms until after we left. During the Gen Con years it was camping out in the parking lot and showering in the gym.
Randu
Doh, yep. My brain went mixy there. I was conflating Parkside with the dorm space available at UWM when the Con moved to Mecca...can't recall that dorm offhand. It was a bus ride away, listed in the Housing options, but if I remember it was around $15/night/person.
I was only at Parkside for one year, as a little dude, and didn't stay overnight.
But my argument remains--the con center space will be cleaner to start with :)
I will not diss Sandberg Hall at UWM in Milwaukee. It was GREAT. Yea you could put 5 people in the suite with their own beds and it came out to about $75 for Wed-Sunday nights. I usually bummed rides from people in the parking gargage.I told them I worked for Chaosium and that was my ticket downtown. You knew we out grew Milwaukee when we filled up UWM.
Update from today's IBJ
(The sale of the property to Drury includes the adjacent surface lot to the west, where Drury would build a parking garage and tower of rooms as tall as 17 stories, said Mark Kohl, Drury Development Corp.’s vice president of development.
A 350-room hotel would rank as the city’s 10th-largest according to IBJ statistics. By comparison, the Embassy Suites Indianapolis Downtown has 360 rooms. With 1,005 rooms, the JW Marriott is by far the city’s biggest hotel.)
That's going to be 350 rooms added to the mix. Good news.
This is good news. I just selfishly wish the Pan Am Plaza would get developed into another hotel. It'd be close enough to be added to the Skywalk. And there's room there for a pretty decent sized hotel.
For those who do not know the Drury usually has a nice free breakfast and a manager's reception in the late afternoon, snack and beer and wine. Breakfast is "about on par with Embassy Suites" I said 'about'. Regarding the Pam Am Plaza Hotel that will be delt with when Visitindy decides on the next ICC expansion, which is in the "city parents disscusion phase". Next they will announce and ask for designs and such and start the haggling for funding. It's a grand dance we in Indianapolis have done a bunch of times and it's fun to watch. Besides a Pam Am project and the six known hotels in the different modes of planning don't be surprised if the Dor Brothers put one or two hotels neat Lucas Oil. That is there private area. Randuy