The Shinola Hotel project, announced last week, is the latest in a string of hotel projects planned or underway in downtown Detroit.
While increasing investment in the city is good news, it raises the question: Can Detroit support the number of hotel projects planned and under consideration for the central business district?
Experts say yes. There's demand for 800 to 1,000 more rooms downtown in the next two to three years.
With the increasing population, activity and corporate presence downtown, there is undoubtedly support for additional rooms, said Mike O'Callaghan, COO and executive vice president of the Detroit Metro Convention & Visitors Bureau.
Detroit's downtown hotel occupancy and average daily rates are up this year, bucking the declines cities including Chicago, Pittsburgh and Cleveland have seen this year, O'Callaghan said.
Year to date through July, average daily occupancy for the 5,000 hotel rooms in Detroit's central business district was 67.6 percent, up from 66.3 percent for the same period of 2015, he said, referencing data from STR.
The average daily rate for the same period increased to $154, up from $148 for the first seven months last year and $141 for the period in 2014.
The occupancy number so far this year is about 1.5 percentage points better than the counties of Wayne, Oakland and Macomb, O'Callaghan said.
In the years before Detroit's comeback, suburban hotels would fill up first. But now, the Detroit hotels are, and the overflow is going to the suburbs
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