Buoyed by one of the sharpest year-over-year hotel occupancy
increases among major U.S. markets in 2014 and an influx of large conventions,
Atlanta is considering a pair of development projects that would bolster the
city's relatively stagnant full-service hotel supply.
[Please click here to view the digital edition of the 2015 Corporate Travel Index, featuring all perdiem listings, downloadable as a pdf.]
The city in December 2014 issued a request for
qualifications for a 300-room full-service hotel adjacent to Hartsfield–Jackson
Atlanta International Airport, according to the Atlanta Business Chronicle, as part of a larger proposed
development of office space and retail at the site.
Meanwhile, Georgia World Congress Center Authority in
January 2015 issued an RFQ for a large convention hotel of at least 800 rooms
that could be built next to a planned retractable-roof stadium for the National
Football League's Atlanta Falcons.
However early in the process of development, the RFQs
reflect an interest in ground-up construction of large, upscale-or-higher
hotels that in many other cities has diminished during the past few years. It
also reflects current hotel demand trends, as the Atlanta metropolitan area in
2014 had the largest year-over-year hotel occupancy increase among the 25 major
U.S. markets that hospitality research firm STR monitors. The Atlanta
metropolitan area's 68.2 percent occupancy was 8.1 percent higher than 2013
levels, according to STR.
Along with the boost in occupancy came a hike in hotel
rates, according to BTN's Corporate
Travel Index data. Atlanta hotel rates paid by BCD Travel corporate clients
from January to November 2014 were more than 10 percent higher year over year,
well above the average 3.3 percent increase posted by the entire list of 100
U.S. cities in the index. Adding taxes and fees to that measure gives Atlanta a
2014 average daily hotel cost of $161.94, ranking as the 41st costliest U.S.
city on BTN's list.
Adding that hotel cost to Atlanta's average daily car rental
expense of $52.34 (good for 12th place on BTN's
list) and its $98.99 average daily dining cost (44th) gives the city a total
CTI per diem of $313.27, ranking it 34th among U.S. cities.
Elsewhere In Atlanta
• Atlanta's 2014 hotel occupancy increase wasn't limited to
transient travel. The city's 21 citywide conventions in 2014 were the most it
has hosted in a single year and drew more than a million attendees, according
to the Atlanta Convention and Visitors Bureau. The CVB claimed that 21 of the
23 largest events in the city last year exceeded attendance goals.
• Hartsfield in 2014 remained the world's busiest airport in
terms of passengers, with 96.2 million arriving or departing, a record for the
airport and about 1.9 percent higher than the 2013 total, according to the
airport. That trend has continued in 2015, with a January total of 7.3 million
arriving or departing passengers that is up about 6.6 percent from January
2014.
• Hartsfield last year was the first airport to pilot a free
U.S. Customs and Border Protection mobile passport-control app, enabling
passengers arriving at the airport to submit their passport information and
customs declaration via the app and receive a digital bar-coded receipt to be
scanned by customs officers. The program since has expanded to Miami
International Airport. Hartsfield, meanwhile, last summer launched free Wi-Fi
access, following a $5.6 million installation effort.
• Major League Baseball's Atlanta Braves after the 2016
season will leave Turner Field for the new suburban Cobb County stadium,
leaving the downtown site ripe for redevelopment once the stadium is knocked
down. No plans have been agreed to as yet, but the potential exists for further
mixed-use development, possibly including additional hotel supply.
This
report originally appeared in the March 16, 2015, issue of Business Travel News.