Skirvin owners pitch plans to make landmark the city's headquarters hotel
Owners of downtown's Skirvin Hilton are making a pitch first made a century ago — that the landmark be made the city's “headquarters hotel.”
BY STEVE LACKMEYER
Published: April 9, 2011
John Weeman, of Skirvin Partners, and Bill Otto, president of Marcus Hotels and Resorts, have submitted a proposal to city officials that calls for a second [425] room tower to be built just north of the hotel, where a BancFirst drive-thru is now located. The Santa Fe Garage would be razed and replaced with a smaller parking structure and “gateway” that would connect the hotel via skywalk to a convention center in Bricktown along Main Street.
The convention center site, which currently consists of buildings owned by Don Karchmer and surface parking he leases from the city, was one of the finalists emerging from last month's meeting of the MAPS 3 convention center subcommittee.
“We think the north Bricktown site in combination with the Skirvin gives Oklahoma City a unique opportunity to build on the strengths of Oklahoma City as a convention venue,” Weeman said. “It's a once in a lifetime opportunity to create a link between the downtown core, where all the major hotels are located, and Bricktown, where all the wonderful things done with MAPS have been accomplished.”
Weeman argues the site holds up best to site selection criteria set by Populous, the Kansas City consultant hired by the city to determine the best locations for the $280 million convention center approved by voters as part of MAPS 3 in 2009.
Those criteria include proximity to Bricktown, downtown's restaurants, shops and entertainment venues and area hotels. Other criteria include civic presence, site feasibility and land acquisition costs.
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Weeman is providing Populous and city officials with another argument for going with the proposal — an evaluation of existing and incoming hotel supply that shows a plunging occupancy if a full 600-room conference hotel is added to downtown. The city also has been advised it can expect to chip in at least $60 million for a new conference hotel.
The market could easier absorb a 425-room expansion of the Skirvin, Weeman said, and the city would be asked for “far less” subsidy than it would for a new 600-room hotel.
“The whole function of how to make it work will be the function of the same dream team that made the Skirvin work,” Weeman said. “At the Skirvin, you've got a great deal of the infrastructure already in place — we have a ballroom, we have the lobby, we have one restaurant on site.”
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