Deal Is Finalized For UF Hotel/Convention Center On Edge of Campus

April 24, 1998

GAINESVILLE — The Promos Hotel Corp., through its Doubletree Hotel subsidiary, announced today it has finalized an agreement with the University of Florida to manage a hotel and conference center on the western edge of campus.

With the final piece finally in place for the deal, preliminary construction that began in late March will move forward rapidly on the west side of Southwest 34th Street at Hull Road. Major construction will begin late this summer with a completion date scheduled for spring 2000.

When completed, the site will feature a 20,000-square-foot conference center and a 242-room hotel with a restaurant and lounge, health club and outdoor swimming pool.

UF President John Lombardi has been pushing for a university hotel and conference center for years, aiming for a privately funded and privately managed project.

“This conference center meets a long-time need of the university and the community for a facility capable of attracting first-rate conferences and events to this county,” Lombardi said. “We have many opportunities that now go elsewhere for the lack of a quality place of sufficient size. This conference center will bring those events to Gainesville and Alachua County and help us with our academic programs and our economic development.”

With more programs on a single campus than all but a few universities in the country, UF has long needed an affiliated center to host events. Such a meeting place will help the university grow and increase its stature as one of the nation’s leading research institutions, Lombardi said. UF is one of only 15 land grant universities in the prestigious Association of American Universities, a group of the top 62 public and private institutions in North America.

The facilities will be owned by Mass Mutual Life Insurance Co. represented by Cornerstone Real Estate Advisers, developed by Florida Conference Center Associates Inc., built by Hardin Construction Group Inc. of Atlanta and managed by Doubletree.

Although the center is not supported by any UF or state dollars, UF Administrative Affairs Vice President Gerald Schaffer said the hotel and conference center will be closely affiliated with the university.

“A long-term lease of university property provided the opportunity for a perfect setting on which to construct the facility,” Schaffer said. “Universitywide continuing education activities will be significantly enhanced as a result of the hotel conference center.”

He said he is sure the community will be pleased with Doubletree’s management and presentation of the center, because the company has a good history of such complexes with other universities, including Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

“We are pleased to be chosen as the hotel management company for such a high-profile project, the first Doubletree university hotel slated for Florida,” said David L. Stivers, senior vice president in Doubletree’s University Hotel and Conference Center Division. “Our continued alliance with many of the finest universities across the nation — with even more in the planning stages — support a strong commitment to offer a convenient meeting destination and full-service hotel to faculty, students and members of their families.”

Lombardi said UF also is pleased by with management company’s selection and pointed out that while it has taken a long time to come to this point, there were sound reasons for proceeding cautiously.

“The length of time it has taken to identify the right sponsors for this project reflects the university’s concern that this be a financially sound enterprise that has the ability to operate the conference center without subsidies from the university,” Lombardi said. “Consequently, we have worked closely with the group awarded the right to develop this center to ensure that the financial structure underlying this project is sound. This has taken some time as we have had to demonstrate the dynamic and growing nature of the greater Gainesville and Alachua County community as a destination for conferences and conventions to various groups.”