The Galt House, Louisville’s largest hotel, is joining the Trademark Collection by Wyndham as an independently owned soft-branded property.

The flagship hotel, which will begin a $80 million renovation this June, will be Wyndham Hotel Group’s largest single addition in North America.

Galt House Hotel is the largest downtown meeting, convention, and conference hotel in the region, with 1,310 guest rooms and 130,000 sq. ft. of event space that can host meetings of up to 3,000 attendees.

There is a lot of preparation going on in Japan for the Olympics, which will be held in Tokyo in 2020.  In addition to new hotels and venues that will expand the many existing options for events, transportation infrastructure will be transformed. Plans include a ring road that will bypass central Tokyo, a central arterial road that will better connect central Tokyo to the Tokyo Bay area, a new railway connecting Haneda Airport and Tokyo Station, plus improvements to the existing Narita Airport railway system that will cut transit time from thirty minutes to a mere eighteen.

On Thursday, April 12, meeting professionals around the world came together to celebrate our great industry. I was lucky enough to be in Las Vegas – the meetings capital of the world – for a media tour centered around Global Meetings Industry Day (GMID).

Some key facts about meetings and Las Vegas:

The Reno-Sparks Convention & Visitors Authority (RSCVA) Board of Directors has appointed global entertainment and convention venue management company, SMG, to oversee operations at Reno-Sparks’ major convention and entertainment facilities.

The four-year operating agreement includes the RSCVA-owned Reno-Sparks Convention Center (RSCC), the state-owned Reno-Sparks Livestock Events Center (RSLEC), as well as the Reno Events Center (REC) and the National Bowling Stadium (NBS), which are both owned by the City of Reno.

VISIT Milwaukee has launched a new website designed to redefine the city’s image for visitors and capture the spirit of Milwaukee’s people, neighborhoods, events and attractions, while driving visitation to the region.

The Hard Rock Hotel Daytona Beach is the destination’s newest beachfront hotel, and the fourth Hard Rock Hotel in Florida. Located just over a mile from the iconic Daytona Beach Pier and the Ocean Center meeting, convention and event complex, the 200-room property offers 20,000 sq. ft. of indoor and outdoor meeting space.

Hilton Des Moines Downtown opened its doors for guests on March 21, with a public ribbon-cutting and a grand opening event.

Located just five miles from Des Moines International Airport, Hilton Des Moines Downtown is connected to the Iowa Events Center via the Des Moines Skywalk. It is the first convention hotel to open in Des Moines in more than ten years.

Fairmont Austin, the brand’s second largest property worldwide, opened its doors on Mar. 5 – just in time for the 2018 South by Southwest conference and festival.

The long-anticipated property, initially scheduled to open in June of last year, supersedes the J.W. Marriott Austin as the largest hotel in Central Texas. It is also now the largest Fairmont hotel in the U.S.

In 2017, Canada earned three of the top five spots in The Economist’s list of most livable cities worldwide. Many event planners are familiar with Vancouver and Toronto but are perhaps less familiar with the third city named to the list: Calgary.

The city of Louisville, Ky., has added another high-end brand to its growing portfolio of hotel properties, in this case, a $300 million development designed to attract larger conventions and more leisure travelers to the Derby City.