Hotel Update: Construction on floors 4 through 8 are progressing well and it appears that the hotel is scheduled to open this winter.  The current unoccupied floors of the Liberty Building, floors four through eight, would become the new home to Hyatt Place Hotel. This would create the first condotel in Iowa where a building is part hotel-part condominiums. Personally, having lived in Florida, condotels were quite common and always some of the most desirable places to live. The residents were extremely happy with the news.

With just under 100 new hotel rooms for the downtown market, this would be Hyatt’s first entrance into the downtown Des Moines market and a first for Hyatt Place in Iowa. The hotel would feature a separate entrance than the current resident’s entrance, a first floor lobby, with small bar and food area. Condo residents would enjoy most of the amenities a hotel brings such as morning newspaper delivery, 24-hour concierge service and even a brand new swimming pool in the basement of the building.

Nelson Development would remain the owner of the building and hotel. Nelson currently owns other hotels, residential and commercial buildings both here in Iowa and other cities in the mid-west.

Here are some pictures of what a typical Hyatt Place looks like.

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Kiplinger’s Personal Finance magazine has named Des Moines among its top 10 cities. Here are some quotes from the article:

The city is working to lure back young Iowans and attracting global talent by developing its downtown and promoting the jobs available in the many industries that flourish there. Other big draws: low-cost housing, plus the city’s long-touted reputation for family-friendliness and a “19-minute commute.”

Full text of the article can be found here: http://www.kiplinger.com/magazine/archives/best-cities-2010-des-moines-iowa.html

These were done by volunteers earlier today on Court Avenue.

For 12 years, Forbes has been ranking the Best Places for Business and Careers and, at the top of this year’s list, was Des Moines , Iowa . “ Des Moines favorable regulatory environment and well-educated workforce makes it an attractive destination for high-value-added, well-paying industries,” stated Sunayana Mehra, an economist at Moody’s Economy.com.

With a metro area comprised of 562,000 people, Des Moines business and living costs are more than 10% below the national average. In addition, 33 percent of adults are college educated, while 92 percent possess high school diplomas. The economic and housing outlook for Des Moines also looks bright. Employment rates are expected to increase 2.7 percent over the next three years and household incomes are projected to rise 2.9 percent.

Forbes gathered a variety of statistical data from over 200 cities, ranking them based on items such as business and living costs, past and projected job growth, educational attainment, projected economic growth and quality of life. For more information, please read the complete article published on Wednesday, April 14, 2010.

Editor’s Note: This was originally ran as an April Fools Joke, but what a great concept.

Des Moines is becoming the Art Capital of the Mid-West! This week it was announced that a new school for the arts would be created and moved into the Ruan Center with classes starting Fall of 2011. With Wellmark Blue Cross Blue Shield moving into their new headquarters this summer/fall, the 2nd tallest building in the city would have had a tremendous amount of office space come open on the market. Problem solved! A newly chartered school for the arts is taking over the space.

Organizers stated that the new school, to be called, the Des Moines School of Art & Design, will be headquartered in downtown Des Moines. The Ruan Center will become the new home for up approximately 1,000 students, with campus housing for 730 of them in the Ruan Center. Previous office space will be converted to dormitories for the students and the remaining floors will become educational classes.

The school will over Bachelors of Arts and Masters of Fine Arts in photography, graphic media, paint, film/video, visual arts, architecture and design. With tuition starting at $30,000 a year for off-campus students and $42,000 a year to

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2010 is starting off with good sales so far, January was pretty good, but February not so much, but it could have been the horrible weather we had last month. Know one in their right mind would get out and look at places in that.

2010 Year-to-Date Downtown Condo Sales:

The City of Des Moines, Operation Downtown, and Skywalk Association are conducting a survey to gather information about downtown Des Moines’ skywalk system and its users and are currently reviewing possible improvements to the Skywalk System. Your input as a user of the Skywalk System is very important in identifying areas of improvement. Please take a moment to fill out the following brief survey by Wednesday, March 24th:
https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/7XWWVHX
Signage mockups will be displayed in April in the Skywalk System for your feedback as well.

I found this online and thought readers might be interested in seeing some health stats on Iowa’s most populous county since it’s the home of the City of Des Moines.

Source: http://www.countyhealthrankings.org/iowa/polk