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November 17, 2006
Tis The Season To Be Thankful
Downtown Dallas is heavily populated during the day with corporate employees piling into the city's skyscrapers that comprise the magnificent skyline. The restaurants are bustling at lunchtime. However the nighttime is dramatically different...the downtown area is a dead zone.
The city has been undergoing a campaign to revitalize the downtown area for several years and one of the key entities responsible for its burgeoning rebirth is the hospitality industry.
Dallas landmark hotels such as The Adams Mark, the Renaissance, and the Hilton Anatole (a current Edelman Southwest client), which sit in and around the downtown area, have joined forces with the Dallas CVB and other city and local tourism entities to attract group, business and leisure travelers from around the country, The state-of-the-art American Airlines Center built in 2001 attracts concert goers and sports enthusiasts. It is because of the city, the CVB and these hospitality entities that have made Dallas one of the top meeting and convention cities in the country and one of the top leisure destinations among U.S. travelers.
Welcome newcomers including the Ritz-Carlton, the W and the Mandarin Oriental, all of which are building spectacular hotels and high-rise residential condos around downtown Dallas. These hospitality entities are leading the way for increased meetings and conventions, business and leisure travelers to this sleepy part of town. They're even attracting more Dallas-ites to the downtown area. Other developers are now solidifying plans to expand the Arts District, build more residential lofts and shopping and entertainment venues in and around downtown Dallas.
As public relations professionals who spend our days positioning and publicizing our tourism clients, talking with the media about tourism trends and the positive impact that the hospitality and tourism industries make on U.S. cities and the economy, do we ever take a step back and really realize how robust the impact is on our own hometowns?
Maybe it's because the season of being thankful is upon us that I'm writing about this but I say thank you to the hospitality industry for your part in revitalizing downtown Dallas. Thank you for securing Dallas' place on the map as a major player for meetings and conventions, for attracting leisure travelers. Thank you for creating economy and more jobs...today and tomorrow. And Happy Thanksgiving to all.
Posted by heidi.mckinley at November 17, 2006 6:48 PM