Ernst & Young this morning has released its US 2009 Lodging Report, which, turns out, has nothing to do with a certain high-end gentleman's establishment. Instead, sadly, it's just a lengthy status report on the state of the hotel business in 17 major U.S. cities, Dallas chief among 'em. And as it offers 124 pages of graphs and stats and figures, you may want to skip directly to Page 54, where you'll find the rather sunny chapter devoted to Dallas. (Hey, even with Merten among the cited footnotes too!) The "key takeaways"?
Despite a nationwide economic slowdown, Dallas continues to bolster strong convention center activity, as confirmed by the City of Dallas' dedicated efforts to build a new convention hotel. The city also commands a strong business segment, as substantiated by the continued interest in the downtown area by companies looking to relocate to Dallas, as well as a declining office vacancy rate downtown.Oh, and Dallas's average daily hotel room rate is expected to hold steady at about $94, while revenue per available room in 2008 was $56, up slightly from '07. Apparently, that's a good.The city is further investing in the expansion and modernization of its rail transit lines, which bodes well for its continued success in attracting corporate relocations and convention business. Finally, current economic conditions, which had a negative impact on airline seating capacity, may post a small setback for short-term future lodging demand growth.