GRAND RAPIDS, MI - A new 24-story hotel tower could be just the thing to perk up an under-used section of DeVos Place convention center and solve downtown's need for another convention hotel, the Grand Rapids/Kent County Convention/Arena Authority (CAA) was told Friday, April 21.

The proposal would put a 400-room hotel costing up to $97 million along a section of the convention center located between DeVos Performance Hall and the Windquest Building, which is owned by the family of Amway co-founder Richard DeVos.

If created, the new hotel would enliven an under-used section of the street and create type of convention hotel that as called for last year in a study that looked a ways to strengthen the city's downtown convention business.

The project, which would mean the city of Grand Rapids and Kent County would own a hotel, is still a long ways off from becoming reality, said Richard MacKeigan, regional general manager for SMG, which operates the convention center.

"Nobody is breaking ground tomorrow," said MacKeigan. The next step will be to hire a market consultant to see if a hotel could succeed on the site. "First and foremost, it has to be financially viable."

The city and county also will have to decide if they want to build a private business on land that they jointly own and cannot sell until 2031 under the terms of the bonds they sold to finance the convention center's construction.

The idea behind the hotel proposal came out of a committee that was created in 2015 to come up with a better use for the 200-plus foot section of Monroe Avenue between DeVos Hall and the Windquest building.

The building includes several meeting rooms that are under-used, a rehearsal hall and part of a kitchen. On the second level, a long hallway that's part of the downtown skywalk system skirts the area between the Amway Grand Plaza Hotel and the DeVos Performance Hall.

Brad Thomas, president and CEO of Progressive AE, said they concluded there was little to be done from the street level because the floor of the building - part of the Grand Center that once stood on the spot - was several feet above the sidewalk level.

After concluding they would have to dig out the existing structure down to the foundations, Thomas said they realized they could build any type of building, including a multi-story building.

"That was sort of the 'aha' moment that opened up our thinking," Thomas said. If built, a hotel would not have any impact on the 37-year-old DeVos Performance Hall, which recently underwent improvements to its stage and lobby areas.

The notion of a convention hotel on that spot emerged last December when a "destination asset study" recommended adding onto DeVos Place and building a new downtown hotel with 350 to 500 rooms.

Besides bringing life to an under-used section of Monroe Avenue NW, a new hotel also would energize a long section of the downtown skywalk system between the convention center and the Amway Grand Plaza Hotel.

While the study called for new hotel space, it did not recommend any site in a rapidly changing area of the downtown that saw a new apartment development completed to the north last year and will soon see renovations to Calder Plaza and the city/county administration complex across the street.

Since the "destination asset study" was released, several downtown hotel projects have begun construction or been announced. But none are attached to the convention center, a key part of the recommendation.