With plans for a new convention center hotel nixed by the city, Hotel Tucson City Center InnSuites is looking to improve on what's already there to bring visitors downtown.
The hotel, at 475 N. Granada Ave., is in the middle of a $1.5 million renovation, with significant upgrades to rooms and services that management hopes will help draw more conventions downtown.
Charles Wetegrove, the hotel's general manager, said the hotel decided to renovate in the wake of the city's decision not to go ahead with a new downtown convention center.
The improvements include upgrades to all 268 studios and suites, a redone Jacuzzi and Olympic-sized swimming pool, new paint, artwork, new furniture, an updated security system and fiber-optic Internet that will double the hotel's capacity, to allow 500 people to surf the Web at once.
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"It's like night and day," said Wetegrove.
Hotel Tucson City Center is owned by Arizona-based InnSuites Hospitality Trust, which is paying for the renovations.
While these improvements are privately funded, Wetegrove said InnSuites is lobbying the city to consider incentives for downtown hotels, within a mile of the convention center, to further upgrade their rooms and suites.
The current renovations are scheduled to be complete by June 1. Some improvements, such as better Internet service and refurbished rooms in the hotel's four-story tower, will be finished this week, in preparation for the Tucson Gem & Mineral Show.
Did You Know
Hotel Tucson City Center used to be a Quality Inn & Suites and, before that, the Ramada Inn Downtown.
Contact reporter Alex Dalenberg at adalenberg@azstarnet.com or 807-8429.