Convention center, Downtown on draft list for Curry

[finehoe]

Americans do love their shopping.  I'm always flabbergasted when I see tour buses unloading their charges at the local mall.

"Let's go buy something at this Ann Taylor that's just like the one we have at home!"

[finehoe]

I want conventions revolving around industry.

Not industry, "infrastructure innovation for the future."   

[CCMjax]

As much as I hate the idea of a convention center at the Town Center, how much you want to bet that's what ends up happening?  "Well, we have to follow the market trends."

[The_Choose_1]

Funny I didn't say Alvin did I? I will say having the condo & apartments in the downtown area is a good start. But unless you live in them most people leave downtown after work. And don't return unless to eat at over priced restaurants or go to a used bookstore. It's time for the Miracle Worker Curry to bring us all the promise land. 

Gosh how do all those other cities manage?

What in your opinion are the overpriced restaurants?  In my opinion, Olive Garden is overpriced.  What is it $12-15 for an entree of defrosted food that I can buy in a box in the grocery for $8-10?

I was speaking about downtown Restaurants? Like the La Cena Ristorante on N. Laura St, Candy Apple Cafe, Benny's Steak & Seafood, and others. The Candy Apple Cafe & Benny's Steak & Seafood is fine for lunch but not to return for dinner IMO.

My comment about Olive Garden went right over your head...of course there is no Olive Garden downtown.

Let me digest the rest of your reply.

So one of the only legitimate Italian restaurants in all of NE FL, universally known as an expensive restaurant by all going in, is a "typical overpriced downtown restaurant?"  I guess Olive Garden it is...$12-15 for defrosted food that can be bought in a box at the store for $8-10.  Or Johnny Carino's.  Romano's?  Buca di Bepo?  Carraba's?  Maggiano's?  Spaghetti Factory?

By the way...I just looked up the menu (bc it's been a while)...$25-35 for entrees and $9-15 for starters for quality home-cooked Italian food in a small/intimate restaurant with good service and decades long reputation (and same chef all along...no matter how crazy he is, he has earned a name locally).  And by the way, the portions are HUGE and you will take home your next two lunches.  This might be the best Italian in town.  You call that unreasonable?!?!  Please go back to your mobile home in Middleburg...

Listen.  Every downtown in America typically has higher prices for food (or for anything).  Similar to why your corner bodega/Walgreens charges 20-30% more for the same staples you can find in a massive supermarket.  I'm pretty sure a footlong Subway in SF's financial district costs $8 or so while it costs $6-7 elsewhere.  A pack of cigarettes in the financial district/Union Square can cost up to $12-15 or more whereas in my neighborhood it costs $7 (not that I'm a smoker...only when drinking).  A 750 mL bottle of Belvedere in a club costs $500 whereas it costs $35-40 in some stores.

If things *weren't* overpriced, at all, in DT Jax, that would mean there is no visitor/worker crush, at all, and that wouldn't be good, at all.  I still have a hard time believing anything in DT Jax is really all that "overpriced", though.

A place by the name of Benny's Steak & Seafood just sounds terrible.  I doubt you could pay me to eat at a place like that.  But I guarantee you every other strip mall in suburban Jacksonville has an exact copy of this restaurant.  So just don't go~!  What makes this one "overpriced" compared to the hundreds of other copies?

I swear, you and so many other posters that crawl out of the woodwork in Jacksonville...you only continue the stereotype.  And if you don't know what I'm talking about, don't worry about it.  If you do, wear your stereotypes with honor I guess.


Recently there have been threads/discussions on places, and cheap places in particular, to eat in downtown Jax.  Clearly there is a dearth all the way around due to lack of workers/visitors/residents, but there are places (dozens in fact, that you didn't list out).  Maybe research a bit.  This forum often disputes me, proves me wrong, and then points me in the right direction for when I come into town.  You live there!  Do better...

"Please go back to your mobile home in Middleburg..." Boy what a real tool you must be. Downtown will Never be what it once was. And I can live with this. So while I grill my steaks on the Ortega river tonight I will raise my glass in the air wishing you were with me so I could pour it on your head. 

[The_Choose_1]

As much as I hate the idea of a convention center at the Town Center, how much you want to bet that's what ends up happening?  "Well, we have to follow the market trends."

There are no market trends.  We just do not have a convention destination base of any kind in jacksonville. 

We used to. 

When we had thirty more hotels downtown, and all the nightlife and action you could find in any city outside of New Orleans.

But building a convention center, paradoxically helped to destroy the convention business in jacksonville.  The money needed to fund the convention center took booking fees away from the hotels, and when caterers negotiated exclusivity contracts with the Convention Center (the old Colliseum) they took much needed food and beverage sales away from the hotels.

This helped to start closing the medium range hotels and without their customers, the downtown began to suffer.

By the time Jake Godbold decided to resurrect the old Train Terminal as a "Convention Center", conventions were swiftly becoming a thing of the past.

The final nail in the coffin was put into the business when the City gave SMG the management contract for the 'convention center', a firm based in Philadelphia, with a plethora of other clients and city offerings to offer their stable of customers.

We finally worked our way down to Cheerleading conventions (with no real push behind them to help them grow into something significant from the city's auspices) and the quality of life literally being dynamited out of the ground by the various downtown redevelopment agencies.

Convention Centers have become the all present snake oil products of the professional 'consultant' class.

They are really only a way to stimulate the sales of the local contractors/builders for a few years and then they are a huge albatross around the neck of the city.

Heck, even Muncie Indiana build the Horizon Center, in hopes of a brave new future in conventioneering.

Convention Cities work when they are heavily invested in entertainment and quality of life (we have a 2 million dollar total budget to eke out across the county), when they have a diverse micro economy of venues, hotels, entertainment offerings, a service obsessed downtown environment, and most importantly when their development is driven by a strong local group whose fortunes are based on hotels/hospitality.

Traditionally, this was done by the chamber of commerce.  When Conventions flocked to Jacksonville, they did so because every one who was a member of the Jacksonville Chamber was an agent of the industry.  If you went to a convention in another city, the chamber expected you to find out who organized the convention and pitch them Jacksonville as the location.

That is not what is going on here, and building a convention center is simply a big fat porkbarrel deal to pay back wealthy Builder Association political allies.

Successful convention cities grow from conventions to larger facilities, not the other way around.

When Theresa Price was the director of City Events we looked at a few ways to jumpstart this process.  There are easy, effective, and downright fun ways to attract conventions that will grow into something significant back to Jacksonville, and it would be a blast to implement them.  But none of them involve having to spend 200 million on a new center with no prospective clients asking for one to be built.

"That is not what is going on here, and building a convention center is simply a big fat porkbarrel deal to pay back wealthy Builder Association political allies." OMG Stephendare here is where I agree with you 100%. Not that you care. But this is what Curry is going to be doing for this first couple of years in office. Paying back all the favors & money that was given to him to win the Mayor's office isn't politics great.

[simms3]

As much as I hate the idea of a convention center at the Town Center, how much you want to bet that's what ends up happening?  "Well, we have to follow the market trends."

There are no market trends.  We just do not have a convention destination base of any kind in jacksonville. 

We used to. 

When we had thirty more hotels downtown, and all the nightlife and action you could find in any city outside of New Orleans.

But building a convention center, paradoxically helped to destroy the convention business in jacksonville.  The money needed to fund the convention center took booking fees away from the hotels, and when caterers negotiated exclusivity contracts with the Convention Center (the old Colliseum) they took much needed food and beverage sales away from the hotels.

This helped to start closing the medium range hotels and without their customers, the downtown began to suffer.

By the time Jake Godbold decided to resurrect the old Train Terminal as a "Convention Center", conventions were swiftly becoming a thing of the past.

The final nail in the coffin was put into the business when the City gave SMG the management contract for the 'convention center', a firm based in Philadelphia, with a plethora of other clients and city offerings to offer their stable of customers.

We finally worked our way down to Cheerleading conventions (with no real push behind them to help them grow into something significant from the city's auspices) and the quality of life literally being dynamited out of the ground by the various downtown redevelopment agencies.

Convention Centers have become the all present snake oil products of the professional 'consultant' class.

They are really only a way to stimulate the sales of the local contractors/builders for a few years and then they are a huge albatross around the neck of the city.

Heck, even Muncie Indiana build the Horizon Center, in hopes of a brave new future in conventioneering.

Convention Cities work when they are heavily invested in entertainment and quality of life (we have a 2 million dollar total budget to eke out across the county), when they have a diverse micro economy of venues, hotels, entertainment offerings, a service obsessed downtown environment, and most importantly when their development is driven by a strong local group whose fortunes are based on hotels/hospitality.

Traditionally, this was done by the chamber of commerce.  When Conventions flocked to Jacksonville, they did so because every one who was a member of the Jacksonville Chamber was an agent of the industry.  If you went to a convention in another city, the chamber expected you to find out who organized the convention and pitch them Jacksonville as the location.

That is not what is going on here, and building a convention center is simply a big fat porkbarrel deal to pay back wealthy Builder Association political allies.

Successful convention cities grow from conventions to larger facilities, not the other way around.

This is all so true (and thanks for the history) and with downtown's riverfront setting and mild year round climate, it could easily be a very service-oriented downtown.  But nobody seems to see it that way.  The entertainment focus is all on the SS for some reason and there is no real drive or momentum to create real nightlife districts, really anywhere.

A CC on the courthouse site would never be all that large, just large enough to get decent conventions to town.  And it would be connected to rooms and convenient to amenities, office space, and entertainment.  Would be a start and could never be considered a facility trying to grow a convention city.  I wouldn't even be opposed to a new construction somewhere else...just have a real plan and vision and implement.

Getting visitors and conventioneers into the city seems like an easier feat at this point than getting residents and more office workers.  And I think if enough visitors/conventioneers see downtown and are impressed enough by it, it could just translate to more office workers and more residents.  Plus the amount of residents/office workers we would like downtown in the next 5 years would cost so much in incentives anyway that it's probably no more to just build a better CC and have that constant people flow that could naturally attract residents/workers.

When you refer to Builder Association political allies, I am assuming you're referring to general contractors and other groups that do construction work?  Couldn't the city/mayor avoid a potential kickbacks or pay for play allegation by awarding a contract to an outside team, if they were serious about building a CC?

[finehoe]

To cities the lure of the convention business has long been the prospect of visitors emptying their wallets on meals, lodging, and entertainment, helping to rejuvenate ailing downtowns.

However, an examination of the convention business and city and state spending on host venues finds that:

The overall convention marketplace is declining in a manner that suggests that a recovery or turnaround is unlikely to yield much increased business for any given community, contrary to repeated industry projections. Currently, overall attendance at the 200 largest tradeshow events languishes at 1993 levels.
Nonetheless, localities, sometimes with state assistance, have continued a type of arms race with competing cities to host these events, investing massive amounts of capital in new convention center construction and expansion of existing facilities. Over the past decade alone, public capital spending on convention centers has doubled to $2.4 billion annually, increasing convention space by over 50 percent since 1990. Nationwide, 44 new or expanded convention centers are now in planning or construction.
Faced with increased competition, many cities spend more money on additional convention amenities, like publicly-financed hotels to serve as convention "headquarters." Another competitive response has been to offer deep discounts to tradeshow groups. Despite dedicated taxes to pay off the public bonds issued to build convention centers, many—including Washington, D.C and St. Louis—operate at a loss.
This analysis should give local leaders pause as they consider calls for ever more public investment into the convention business, while weighing simultaneously where else scarce public funds could be spent to boost the urban economy.

http://www.brookings.edu/research/reports/2005/01/01cities-sanders

[thelakelander]

Well, I agree. However, the Orange County Convention Center was in the most suburban place possible, and it is by far the most popular destination for conventions in the country and the largest. I know Disney is there, that area has slightly urbanized, and it is apples to oranges, but it is not anywhere near their urban center.

Technically, I-Drive is more walkable and vibrant than DT Jax. There's also more to do there for tourist within walking distance than there is to do in DT Orlando....

[The_Choose_1]

the core of the city will be still be fairly dead in 2025.

The core of the city is dead, most of you cannot see it. Adding a hotel to the LST, whaat? What business traveler wants to go there, versus the HYatt on the river? The Hyatt is stripping all the rooms down to the core and rebuilding them all, so even if the Marriott comes in the next decade, Hyatt will already have made a presence downtown with the businesses and Visit Jax. There is nothing around the LST, unless Eddie and Chuck want to put up their clients there instead of the Gator Lodge.

Forget what happens in other cities, it does not happen here. MetroJax has been dreaming for years of light rail, where is it? still a dream. Jax is not Orlando or Miami or Tampa or San Fran, but it is sprawl and growth in the burbs, as compared to downtown. Downtown is already dead.

You can use the oft provided http://www.esri.com/data/esri_data/ziptapestry or  http://www.bestplaces.net/zip-code/florida/jacksonville/ and see what is in 32202 right now, what its median income is, the type of person in the area. This is what is here right now, meanwhile the exodus continues away from the core, more and more people are choosing to live further away from the downtown core. Why? Because there is nothing in the core right now, and no matter the number of Healthy Towns or Shipyards or Berkmans, they don't fix the continuing issue that downtown is nowheresville.

Wow.

First of all, you clearly don't travel because hotels also have points systems.  Right now there is no Marriott downtown.  If there is, all of those who prefer Marriott and earn points with them will stay.  It's like an airline, get it?  Many people do have multiple accounts (I have Starwood, Marriott, Kimpton, and Hyatt).

A boutique Marriott, like an Autograph in a restored building like the Adagio I put my Marriotts Rewards parents up in here in SF right in the Theater District, is certainly preferred over some shitty massive convention hotel like the Hyatt in DT Jax.  I'm not the only one who feels that way, and Hyatt in DT Jax is a dime a dozen.  Where Mickey Mouse hoodie wearing families go and large business group travelers.  Even if LST turns into a Courtyard - I guarantee there is a whole slew of people who prefer an intimate, clean Courtyard with a boutiquey feel to that ugly POS we have on the river.


RE: your other comments.  Wow.

Let's all quit dreaming now!  Forget our own dreams!  Forget the dreams of others! Geez, what a miserable miserable way to even think!!


And do you not realize that in EVERY city more people choose to live in the burbs than in a downtown?  Even Manhattan can only fit so many people...most people moving to NYC move to Queens, or the burbs out in LI, CT, NJ, further up NY.  Same with Chicago...that city puts up 10 towers a year to house thousands of new people downtown, but still more people moving to Chicago don't choose to live in a high rise downtown.  But you would never know that if logic fails you and you visit, seeing that massive skyline and all that construction.

DT Jax would be no different.  It would be a world first if all of a sudden more people chose to live in the urban core over the burbs, here in Jax.  Nobody is thinking that will happen.  What people want is just some people to want to live in the urban core.  And we know there is some demand, but THERE ARE NO HOUSING OPTIONS!  When there are housing options, they do fill up.  Perhaps not in record time at record pricing like you have out in San Francisco, but they do fill up, they do make developers/investors happy, generally, and having more and more of these options WILL BE THE ONLY WAY JAX CAN REMAIN COMPETITIVE since MY generation wants these options and we are YOUR future!

You are on the wrong board...you need to join like an Avondale Housing Watch or neighborhood association so you can block all future new restaurants, judge your neighbors' home renovations and tell them what they need to change to get your approval, and oppose any and all new housing developments that will "increase traffic" in your neighborhood.  Not sure if Avondale is your neighborhood or not...but this board will only frustrate you.  Go there...and join such a group.  You'll fit right in and find your true life's calling. 

+10000!
I was just typing up a rant that basically said the same thing! We need people without vision to step out of the way. That is why this city is so far behind.

And lucky for us we have about 7 of them on metrojacksonville daily.

(And lucky for us we have about 7 of them on metrojacksonville daily.) Your Welcome StephenDare I can see with your great knowledge how much has happen to Downtown Jacksonville since you have arrived here. Please keep up your positive attitude and keep clicking your heels together "There's No Place Like Downtown Jacksonville Florida" 

[thelakelander]

For those of you who claim Jax will never have a market for conventions, there's already one. We're already in the business. Like our parks, schools and public transit, it's just substandard and one of several black eyes for a DT everyone claims they want to see turned around. 

No one is making a push for a mega sized space, catered to a market we'll never compete in.  So let's stop talking about Orlando's, Vegas and Chicago when we're getting our asses kicked by Huntsville and Mobile. Instead, we should apply a bit a common sense to the situation in order to place existing complementing uses in a setting where they can actually be utilized more efficiently and help generate a cluster of activity that creates a small pocket for support uses. 

At the end of the day, building an exhibition hall right next to our existing subsidized convention center hotel/ballroom, accomplishes a few key things for downtown.......even if it only results in the same amount of conventions already taking place at the PO:

1. Frees up the old grand passenger rail terminal to become.....a passenger rail terminal and multimodal transportation center.

2. Replaces a dead block (old courthouse site) with a new mixed use modern exhibition hall.....attached to a convention center hotel.

3. Any type of activity generated at that exhibition hall (even the PO generates activity occasionally), creates foot traffic around Bay Street and Jax Landing businesses.... Heck, maybe the old steakhouse spot in the Hyatt could gain a new tenant by the increased foot traffic.

4. Just adding an exhibition box in an area where complementing uses already exists, drops the price to build significantly.

5. Locating that box within walking distance of complementing uses (ex. Florida Theatre, Hyatt, Jax Landing, Elbow clubs and restaurants, etc.) means you don't have to subsidize the same type of uses in a location where they don't already exist.

Replacing the old courthouse with a CC makes a lot of sense in the world. Especially, if we want to see places like Marks, Olio, etc. survive and new restaurants/bars in the vacant spaces adjacent to them.

[For_F-L-O-R-I-D-A]

Well, I agree. However, the Orange County Convention Center was in the most suburban place possible, and it is by far the most popular destination for conventions in the country and the largest. I know Disney is there, that area has slightly urbanized, and it is apples to oranges, but it is not anywhere near their urban center.

Technically, I-Drive is more walkable and vibrant than DT Jax. There's also more to do there for tourist within walking distance than there is to do in DT Orlando....

Now there is and they have made it more walkable. However, even 10 years ago, nevermind when it was built, that was not the case. It was just near the theme parks.

I am all for a CC at the courthouse site. Lake, what would you like to see done with the annex though?

[Adam White]

The mistake I see in alot of these posts is that they assume everyone approaches travel like they do.

Its true some people want an "experience" but some people have work to get done. Especially after sitting in a convention hall all day.

I think you're right. There's not one "correct" answer - but I suppose we have to ensure that whatever approach we take, we do it right.

[The_Choose_1]

The mistake I see in alot of these posts is that they assume everyone approaches travel like they do.

Its true some people want an "experience" but some people have work to get done. Especially after sitting in a convention hall all day.

I think you're right. There's not one "correct" answer - but I suppose we have to ensure that whatever approach we take, we do it right.

When has anything been done right and even under budget in Jacksonville Florida? The Main Library wasn't done right, the city Garage next to the Library on E Duval St was to have a bridge between both buildings but that was canceled. Because the city felt the shoppes on the first floor of the parking Garage wouldn't be used? I see Enterprise is using one of the shoppes but when this garage was first built the stores Never came to pass. And the new Court House was this done right & the state attorneys building how many problems does this old building still have after being redone. The list of doing things right is very short in Jacksonville. Please lets all think good thoughts and click those heels together once more like I asked stephandare to do "There's No Place Like Downtown Jacksonville Florida"

[Tacachale]

For those of you who claim Jax will never have a market for conventions, there's already one. We're already in the business. Like our parks, schools and public transit, it's just substandard and one of several black eyes for a DT everyone claims they want to see turned around. 

No one is making a push for a mega sized space, catered to a market we'll never compete in.  So let's stop talking about Orlando's, Vegas and Chicago when we're getting our asses kicked by Huntsville and Mobile. Instead, we should apply a bit a common sense to the situation in order to place existing complementing uses in a setting where they can actually be utilized more efficiently and help generate a cluster of activity that creates a small pocket for support uses. 

At the end of the day, building an exhibition hall right next to our existing subsidized convention center hotel/ballroom, accomplishes a few key things for downtown.......even if it only results in the same amount of conventions already taking place at the PO:

1. Frees up the old grand passenger rail terminal to become.....a passenger rail terminal and multimodal transportation center.

2. Replaces a dead block (old courthouse site) with a new mixed use modern exhibition hall.....attached to a convention center hotel.

3. Any type of activity generated at that exhibition hall (even the PO generates activity occasionally), creates foot traffic around Bay Street and Jax Landing businesses.... Heck, maybe the old steakhouse spot in the Hyatt could gain a new tenant by the increased foot traffic.

4. Just adding an exhibition box in an area where complementing uses already exists, drops the price to build significantly.

5. Locating that box within walking distance of complementing uses (ex. Florida Theatre, Hyatt, Jax Landing, Elbow clubs and restaurants, etc.) means you don't have to subsidize the same type of uses in a location where they don't already exist.

Replacing the old courthouse with a CC makes a lot of sense in the world. Especially, if we want to see places like Marks, Olio, etc. survive and new restaurants/bars in the vacant spaces adjacent to them.

Lol, what are you trying to do adding reason to this discussion. A convention center must be either an expensive, wasteful boondoggle that can't possibly be beneficial, or it's an absolute necessity that will single-handedly rescue Downtown (and more importantly, Marks Bar). There's no middle ground here!

[CCMjax]

The mistake I see in alot of these posts is that they assume everyone approaches travel like they do.

Its true some people want an "experience" but some people have work to get done. Especially after sitting in a convention hall all day.

I think you're right. There's not one "correct" answer - but I suppose we have to ensure that whatever approach we take, we do it right.

When has anything been done right and even under budget in Jacksonville Florida? The Main Library wasn't done right, the city Garage next to the Library on E Duval St was to have a bridge between both buildings but that was canceled. Because the city felt the shoppes on the first floor of the parking Garage wouldn't be used? I see Enterprise is using one of the shoppes but when this garage was first built the stores Never came to pass. And the new Court House was this done right & the state attorneys building how many problems does this old building still have after being redone. The list of doing things right is very short in Jacksonville. Please lets all think good thoughts and click those heels together once more like I asked stephandare to do "There's No Place Like Downtown Jacksonville Florida"

Government funded and lead projects rarely go well and under budget, even in more prosperous cities, but things like libraries and courthouses are a necessity obviously and are reasons why we pay taxes.  It is also hard to get those projects to run smoothly with all the talking heads involved.  That is why it is sooooo important to have private investors and private projects.  Like I mentioned in a previous post, Quicken Loans investing in downtown Detroit to attract young people to their company.