Acknowledging that it may create an excessive number of hotel rooms in the short term, St. Louis-based Drury Inns Inc. has unveiled plans for a new 180-room hotel in Cape Girardeau in an area that the company hopes eventually will warrant that many rooms.

A new seven-story Drury Inn & Suites is being planned for a seven-acre tract at the southeast corner of Interstate 55 and Highway 74 on property that also will include three unnamed restaurants, said Eric Strand, vice president of marketing and sales.

Construction is expected to start next summer, and Strand said it should be finished by the middle of 2005. Drury Inn's plans for a Thrifty Inn on the southwest corner of that intersection have been abandoned in favor of this hotel, Strand said.

Space will be allocated for three 6,000-square-foot restaurants, Strand said. Strand said no contracts with restaurants have been signed, but the company is in serious conversations with several.

The intersection is a good location for a new hotel with the new Bill Emerson Memorial Bridge expected to open in December, Strand said. Highway 74 from the bridge to the hotel will be highly used, he said.

"We expect there will be an oversupply of rooms in the market for several years, but Cape is our hometown and we are taking a long-term view," Strand said. "The city is committed to growth, and we believe this will be the right location to benefit from that growth."

Drury Inns Inc. has 105 hotels, primarily in the Midwest, and is owned by Cape Girardeau natives Bob Drury, Charles Drury and Jerry Drury. They already own Drury Lodge, Drury Suites and Pear Tree Inn in Cape Girardeau and Drury Inn & Suites in Fruitland. Strand said none of those hotels will be closed.

Their brother Jim Drury owns Midamerica Hotels, which is not affiliated with Drury Inns Inc. Midamerica Hotels recently announced plans to tear down the Holiday Inn and rebuild a smaller Holiday Inn Express on William Street near I-55.

The hotel is a new look for Drury Hotels, with a facade composed of stone, brick and stucco. It's a prototype that will also be built in Montgomery, Ala.; Dayton, Ohio; Peoria, Ill.; and two Columbia, Ohio, suburbs.

New design

As part of the new design, the hotel will also feature meeting space that will accommodate up to 400 people. Catering services will be available to those who hold meetings there along with a full line of audio/visual equipment, Strand said.

The hotel will also have an indoor/outdoor swimming pool and whirlpool, exercise room and guest laundry facility. About 30 of the rooms will be two-room suites designed for the extended-stay traveler with fully equipped kitchens. The guest rooms and meeting rooms will offer free high-speed Internet service and guest voice mail.

Marketing opportunity

Cape Girardeau Convention and Visitors Bureau executive director Chuck Martin was pleased by the announcement of the new hotel. He agreed that the hotel will probably provide too many rooms for the short term but said more hotels can only help.

"As we begin to build momentum, it gives us an opportunity to aggressively market our community," he said. "For certain big events, we'll fill those rooms, but early on it may be a bit of a surplus overall, but I think we'll grow into those rooms."

When the new Drury Inn & Suites is complete, Cape Girardeau will have about 1,200 available hotel rooms.

Martin especially liked that the hotel will add more meeting rooms to the area.

"It's definitely a plus to have another facility where you can host a large group of people," he said. "It sounds like it will be a premium property. This can only help, believe me. And the fact that they chose Cape Girardeau as a test market in its new type of hotel is another feather in our cap."

smoyers@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 137