That operating style is bringing him to Pleasant Grove, where he plans to build a 300-suite Embassy Suites hotel and a 100,000-square-foot convention center at the southern of two Interstate 15 interchanges serving the Utah County city, near both Brigham Young University and Utah Valley State College.
Construction is expected to begin next spring and to be completed in the first quarter of 2009.
"People always have to go to Salt Lake for business meetings because space is not available here," said the 87-year-old Hammons, a Springfield, Mo.-based entrepreneur who has built 175 hotels bearing such well-known chain names as Holiday Inn, Radisson, Residence Inn, Hilton and Marriott. "I think we should make [Salt Lakers] come down here."
He hopes to accomplish that with the convention center, which will have a 38,000-square-foot ballroom that could seat 3,500 people or be divided into 24 meeting rooms. It would be adjacent to a 10- to 12-story, four-star hotel on 50 acres adorned with waterfalls and other water features. Hammons put the projected cost at "$150 million easy, maybe $200 million," noting 300-400 jobs will be created.
A second brand-name hotel probably would be built in a second stage, perhaps a Hilton or Marriott, added Pleasant Grove Mayor Michael Daniels. He expects the project to stimulate more commercial development.
"We have long envisioned this intersection as an economic center, a place of growth . . . that will bring people to northern Utah County," said Daniels, speaking Wednesday at a project announcement attended by Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr., Republican U.S. Rep. Chris Cannon, Utah County legislative leaders and dozens of civic boosters.
The economic benefits extend beyond Pleasant Grove to all of Utah, said Huntsman, praising the private sector for building the infrastructure that provides jobs for the state's bright young graduates and pays for education and transportation systems.
He called Hammons' first venture in Utah "an indication that we are a state on the move. The economy is successful and attracting the attention of people who want to be involved in it. . . . I want to thank John Hammons personally for believing in us."
Responded Hammons, whose company John Q. Hammons Hotels & Resorts owns 64 hotels in 23 other states: "This is a great location. We didn't do this accidentally. We studied the whole [Utah] valley."
He and his partner in the project, Provo dermatologist Richard Parkinson, purchased the acreage at the southeast quadrant of I-15 and Pleasant Grove Boulevard from Dennis Baker, an Idaho businessman who spent the past 12 years acquiring the land.
"He [Hammons] is something of a gambler and prides himself in going into a community that might not be quite ready, and he brings that community along," said Parkinson.
Usually with good results, but not always.
Hammons has been known to walk away from projects that don't materialize as well as promised initially.
Just last week, the Dallas suburb of McKinney severed ties with Hammons on a 250-room Marriott Courtyard and an adjoining 75,000-square-foot convention center. McKinney officials said Hammons was not forthcoming with development timelines and other specifics, prompting the city to look to other hotel developers. Hammons said an adjacent development was taking longer to develop than planned.
But other communities have embraced Hammons, who sponsors a September golf tournament on the LPGA tour, spent $32 million to build a baseball stadium in Springfield that enticed the St. Louis Cardinals to put their AA-level farm team there and has his name on the student center at Missouri State University, his alma mater.
mikeg@sltrib.com
