Florida State University is planning a multi-faceted development that would put a new hotel and a convention center in Tallahassee.
The capital city of Florida is home to 250-plus associations and trade groups that often leave Tallahassee to hold events elsewhere.
But a new convention center and hotel could change that.
“It would put us in a position to compete for business that we have not been able to compete for in the past,” said Lee Daniel, executive director of the tourism development of Leon County, known as Visit Tallahassee.
Florida State has hired architecture firms Lewis + Whitlock in Tallahasee and Massachusetts-based Sasaki Associates to design the university’s so-called “Arena District” development.
The development would include the construction of parking, a relocation of the FSU College of Business, and expansion of the university’s basketball training center.
Developers from around the country have bid to handle the “Arena District” project.
“The process is confidential until we get to the final negotiation and then everything becomes formal,” said Dennis Bailey, senior associate vice president for facilities at FSU. [Tallahassee Democrat] – Mike Seemuth