06.24.2009 5:03 pm
Kansas City launches convention hotel study
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
If Kansas City’s leaders want to learn about the economics of a 1,000-room convention hotel, they could drive 200 miles east and talk to the folks who recently foreclosed on the Renaissance Hotel in downtown St. Louis. Instead, they’re spending $500,000 for a feasibility study. According to the Kansas City Star’s Kevin Collison, our neighbors to the west are also creating a 20-member steering committee to think about the idea.
We St. Louisans could save them plenty of time and money. Here are three pieces of free feasibility advice:
- It won’t work without a huge public subsidy.
- It won’t magically create more convention business
- Even with a huge subsidy, it might not succeed.
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David Nicklaus has covered St. Louis business for more than 25 years. His column appears three days a week on the Post-Dispatch business page. 
I used to do some business with Kevin Collison on business stories, all he’s got to do is pull up the TIF reports downtown and show how they aer not even close to paying off the debt service. I will say this, the Power and Light District looks great and downtown KC is getting better and better.
Well done, David. They should send you $100k for that!