The new Washington Marriott Marquis is finally under way. The hotel broke ground on November 10, just weeks after the Washington Convention and Sports Authority announced that it had concluded the sale of approximately $250 million in bonds.
The bonds are being used to finance a portion of the construction costs of the new hotel, located across from the Walter E. Washington Convention Center (owned and managed by WCSA), as well as to fund a $2 million training program for hotel jobs and to refinance WCSA’s 2007 purchase of a portion of the hotel site.
The 1,175-room headquarters hotel, which will offer more than 100,000 square feet of meeting space, is slated to open in 2014. Meeting space will include a 30,000-square-foot grand ballroom, two 10,800-square-foot junior ballrooms, more than 53,000 square feet of meeting rooms, an 18,800-square-foot indoor event terrace, and a 5,200-square-foot rooftop terrace. The $520 million property, one of only four Marriott Marquises in the country, is located in the historic Shaw neighborhood, bounded by Massachusetts Avenue, 9th, 10th, and L streets Northwest.
