As the Savannah International Trade and Convention Center looks to attract and accommodate larger groups, both the trade center and the Westin Savannah Harbor are studying the best way to add 300 hotel rooms on Hutchinson Island, trade center chairman Mark V. Smith told his board Wednesday.
Possibilities include building a freestanding hotel on property west of the trade center or expanding the Westin.
“We met with the Westin and CSX ownership group in September about the possibility of expanding their hotel, and they agreed to go back and study the issue,” Smith said. “We think they will have some favorable conclusions in that regard.”
Smith said the Trade Center Authority, in partnership with the Georgia World Congress Center, was working on setting up a meeting with the Westin later this month to compare notes and share each other’s findings.
“That will give us a lot of feedback and allow our consultant to test his assumptions against their assumptions, hopefully share data and come to a conclusion that we can report in our January meeting,” Smith said.
Encouraged both by its numbers and requests from larger convention groups, the trade center authority in July commissioned PKF Hospitality Research of Atlanta to conduct a three-prong feasibility study that would look at expansion of the trade center, the addition of another 300 hotel rooms and an overall strategic plan for convention business in Savannah.
That study is ongoing and Smith said he expects to present the findings in January.
“One thing I think we have determined is that we can’t really address expanding the building until we know where we are going with the hotel rooms,” he said. “Once that’s established, we can begin to move forward with a plan.”
The board is looking at three possible expansion scenarios.
The most ambitious would double both meeting and exhibit space and add another ballroom for approximately $150 million.
The second scenario would double exhibit space and add a smaller ballroom for $90 million, while a third proposal would increase exhibit space by 50 percent while adding a second ballroom and eight additional meeting rooms at a projected cost of $50 million.
Making a determination on how to expand the room base on the island will need to be the authority’s highest priority for 2015, Smith said, adding that information from the study will provide a platform for discussions with the mayor, city manager, Chatham County officials and other stakeholders.
“We’ve got some work to do in January,” he said.