and closed it, planning to spend $50 million on renovations. Construction was initially expected to conclude early this year.
Downtown hotels were hit hard by the pandemic as conferences and meetings were canceled and travelers scrapped their plans. ThoughThe number of room nights sold in the center city in the first quarter was down 17 percent and occupancy was down about 13 percent from the same three-month period in 2019, according to Source Strategies, a San Antonio-based hotel consulting firm. Daily room rates were up more than 30 percent and revenue per available room was up 13 percent.
Visit San Antonio, the public-private organization that markets the city to convention planners, has 586 meetings on its books for this year. That’s up from 527 in 2019. But fewer people are attending large conventions as companies trim costs and some employees don’t see a need to travel, so hotels don't see as much benefit. Figures reported by the city show 541,587 people attended such events at the Henry B. González Convention Center last year, down 10.5 percent from 2019.