Access Louisville
The latest news on Louisville, Kentucky from the staff of Louisville Business First. We look at trending issues in the Derby City from a business perspective. Join us each week!
Access Louisville
Louisville's convention problem
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
We look at Louisville's hotel development boom on this week's Access Louisville podcast.
Senior Reporter Joel Stinnett breaks down why tourism leaders and convention organizers say Louisville needs more hotel rooms — something he'd looked into for a recent cover story.
While weekend tourism remains strong, the larger opportunity is attracting and growing conventions during the week. We discuss nearly a dozen proposed hotel projects around Downtown Louisville and one in Southern Indiana and what they could mean for the local economy.
We also talk about the proposed Clockworks development in Clarksville, Indiana, where developers plan to anchor a $500 million mixed-use project with a 175-room Marriott hotel.
Later in the show, we discuss the surprising news that no Louisville hospital made the latest U.S. News & World Report rankings of Kentucky's top hospitals. Stinnett explains which health systems topped the list and offers some perspective on how those rankings are determined.
We also cover Baptist Health Floyd's planned emergency department expansion in New Albany and a new bioscience research facility planned as part of the University of Louisville's Innovation Park development near the Belknap Campus. Late in the show we mention the future of the former Theatair X property.
Access Louisville, sponsored by Baird, is a weekly podcast from Louisville Business First. You can listen in the player above. You can also follow it on popular podcast services including Apple Podcasts and Spotify, which are linked above.
Who's going to be staying in all those new hotel rooms they've proposed downtown? We've got some insights on that up next on the Access Louvel Podcast. Thanks for joining us. My name is David Mann, and joining me today are Olivia Strite.
SPEAKER_01Hi guys.
SPEAKER_02And Joel Stinnett.
SPEAKER_03Hello, everyone.
SPEAKER_02Access Louisville is a weekly podcast from Louisville Business First. Each week we bring you the latest news and plenty of sharp opinions about what's going on here in Louisville, Kentucky. This podcast, of course, is sponsored by Baird. Discover the difference Baird can make in your financial life at rwbaird.com/slash Louisville. We'll hear more from Baird later in the show. For now, let's talk about hotels. Joel, I've talked to people before and I say there's gonna be a hotel here and they're building a hotel there. And you know, I kind of show them around and they say, Who's gonna stay in all these hotels? Do we need these hotels? And um, you know, I think that's one reaction. But according to the people you talk to, yeah, we need these hotels, right?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, if you ask people in the industry, we need those hotels. Now, but it's not necessarily for tourists. Um, as uh Louis Tourism CEO Clio Battle said, you know, we're not a beach, no one's coming here to stay an entire week. But from Thursday until Sunday, um, downtown is popping and jammed with tourists, yeah. Uh enjoying the bourbonism and other attractions that we have. But what we need those new hotels for is for to be able to attract more conventions during the week. Um, that's where we're really not only missing, um don't have enough hotels, but don't have enough of the quality of hotels that a lot of people that want to come to these conventions have. Um, because a lot of the people that come to these conventions don't want to necessarily want to stay in just a typical holiday inn or something like that.
SPEAKER_02They don't want to stay at the Red Roof Inn, you know, two counties over. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03They want to stay downtown, they want to stay in a hotel that's it's somewhat unique to like a hotel Bourbon or a distill or something like that.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_03And so the exact number of hotels that we need, number hotel number rooms that we need, I couldn't really get anyone to give me an exact answer on that, but one of the uh conventions that we spoke to with, so they book about five to six thousand peak nights right now for the convention, and they want to grow a very short period of time to where they'd be booking 14,000 peak nights, and they can barely do the five or six thousand right now. So there's you know, they're never gonna get to 14.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. And yeah, if you've ever been to a convention, um, you know, for you know, I've been to the SPJ convention, a couple other conventions here and there. You want to be in the same hotel as the convention a lot of times.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, and that's the other thing is, you know, um, these people that book these conventions don't necessarily want to book at over 42 hotels. Yeah. The people that are staying there. Yeah. You know, they want to have one, two, or three hotels, uh, as few as possible.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. So um I can't remember the final number, but you had a whole list of proposed hotels downtown. How many were on that list?
SPEAKER_03So we focused on uh um the downtown area, not just downtown, but New Lou and as well as some southern Indiana. Uh there's basically nine hotels that have either been announced or through our reporting we have reported uh that are being planned in the area. And that represents just a little bit under 2,600 rooms.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah. And um, let's see here. Olivia, you've uh written about at least one of these developments, which is called the Clockworks. That's the uh former Colgate plant. Um, they see that as a pretty transformative project for tourism in southern Indiana too.
SPEAKER_01And it it's kind of similar in southern Indiana. They're they've been looking for a hotel and sort of conference center package that meets the tourism um demand out in southern Indiana, or at least the demand that they're trying to get to. So the Clockworks development is going to be a $500 million project, and it's starting with the development of a 175-room Marriott. Um, and that is sort of like the anchor for the rest of the development. Once they have the hotels, they can finally start um eyeing up some more conferences. So nothing has been like fully announced at this point, but Wayland Ventures has announced those plans for um that Marriott hotel across the bridge.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and there was also, yeah, the convention center over there that they've been talking about for years. And uh, you know, that could that could bring more uh uh convention traffic to both uh Louisville and southern Indiana, I think. So a story I've told, I swear to God, a hundred times on this podcast is around uh Bourbon and Beyond, I was sitting at a bar in downtown Jeff, and these tourists who were here for the show uh were they they were talking to the bartender, and the bartender said something like, Oh yeah, well, you ever been to Indiana? And they were like, No, we're in Kentucky. And they didn't realize they had walked to Indiana. So I don't think from people from outside of here really realize that it's two separate places. So um, so it's uh, you know, one of those things. But uh Joel, what were a few of the conventions that you talked to uh for this story?
SPEAKER_03Well, the the main convention that's that's featured in the story is the utility expo. And so uh the reason that uh they really like coming to the Affair and Exposition Center is because uh not only they have a lot of you know indoor booths and things like that, but they have a lot of demonstrations they put on outside. You know, you think about the the type of work these people are doing, there's you know infrastructure, utilities and roads, things like that. So they need outdoor space to kind of just show the new equipment and and and things that are coming each year. And uh I spoke to their uh vice president of uh exhibitions and marketing, and it was really a she was very insightful because the utility exposed exact type of event that if we don't get more hotel rooms, Louisville's in danger of losing. They uh had about they've grown from about 17,000 attendees uh pre-pandemic to uh almost 23,000 today, and they want to get to 30,000 uh by the end of the decade. Uh but as I said earlier, they book about five to six thousand peak nights each convention, and right now they're driving in from other counties uh to be able to book all those. Um when like I said, most of their attendees want to stay in downtown Louisville because they want to do the bourbon while they're here, they want to go to the Bat Museum, things like that. And so if when they go to 30,000 uh attendees, they're gonna need about 14,000 peak night hotel rooms, which is just very difficult uh to be able to do at any one time in Louisville and if not impossible.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Yeah, and uh and these losses can happen. You talked about the Equip Expo. I wrote the story. I wrote a story, it's funny. I think I wrote uh one in 2024, 2025 saying the Equip Expo is uh increasingly worried about whether Louisville fits the need that they're trying to do. Uh and then I wrote in February of this year that they are moving half their show, they're gonna rotate between Orlando and Louisville. Um, so they're keeping some business here, it's not a total loss, but you know, we did have all that business, you know. So um, and that's a $30 million impact on that one.
SPEAKER_03So yeah, and that's the exact demographic that Louisville's trying to attract. Um, you know, uh when I spoke to the uh the association of equipment management equipment manufacturers, I mean they have a great relationship with the Expo Center, they love Louisville, they like I said, like the fact that they have indoor and outdoor capabilities. There's no reason for them to want to leave except for the fact that they can't have enough hotel rooms. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, um, definitely something to keep an eye on, I guess. Um I I guess for now, you know, it kind of just seems like a lot of these hotel projects are pending, so there's no real like answer to uh to to whether or not they're happening, and there's some doubts how many of these are gonna happen. You know, a lot of things get proposed and don't actually happen. Um I think we are planning to have Clio Battle on the show uh of Louisville Tourism um on the show here in a couple of weeks, so maybe he can uh give a little more insight on this.
SPEAKER_03And he's got a great a couple great quotes in the story about you know how many developers come to him every month, uh you know, talking about maybe buy building a hotel in Louisville and just how skeptical he is of how many are actually going to get built.
SPEAKER_02All right, interesting stuff. Well, let's move on. We'll talk about another kind of place you stay that's not quite as uh pleasant as a hotel. Um we'll talk about hospitals for a minute. Um, Joel, you recently had a story that no Louisville hospitals have made the the list of the top hospitals in Kentucky in the latest U.S. News and World Report listing. They put out this re this listing every year and say um which are the best hospitals in each state. And unfortunately, Louisville had no hospitals on this list. I can't remember a time when that's happened before. I think in the past there's always at least one on there. So um maybe I'm wrong, but uh but we and we went ahead and did the story anyway, because it's just like shocking that Louisville has none of these hospitals. So uh I guess which uh which Kentucky hospitals did make that list?
SPEAKER_03Well, St. Elizabeth uh healthcare of Edgewood Covington took home the top spot. Uh that's the second year in a row that they've won it. They're also ranked as the number one hospital in the Cincinnati area. Um on top of that, uh the University of Kentucky Albert B. Chandler Hospital, St. Joseph Hospital, Lexington, and Baptist Health Lexington rounded out the top four, which is as far as they go in the rankings. So three uh three Lexington hospitals and uh northern Kentucky.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah. And uh and Baptist, of course, has facilities here in this in Louisville and in this part of the state, but uh uh none of them uh made the list this time. Um you've been covering health care for a long time. It seems like uh you probably read a lot of these lists. Uh, what's your take on how much they matter or how do do I know hospital executives care if they're number one, but they don't seem to care otherwise.
SPEAKER_03I mean, in general, I don't think they matter that much. Yeah. They're nice in the competition between these health systems for uh patients who have health insurance, which is what they all want. They all want to be in affluent areas with people with good health insurance. You know, uh being able to brag about being on this list or being number one on this list is um it can be important for advertising. What's more important is that you just have take care of your patients. Yeah. But it is difficult, you know. If you look at a lot of these the hospitals that make these lists, um, it's very difficult for a hospital like a University of Louisville hospital to make one of these lists because a lot of the way they they do these rankings are based on outcomes and things like that. University of Louisville um gets the sickest of the sickest hospitals. People without insurance, people without insurance, people with a lot of complications, people with a lot of issues like that. And you see University Kentucky um hospital on here, but it's not the community hospital for Lexington. They have uh UK Good Samaritan Hospital, it's more the community hospital for Lexington. Yeah. So uh, you know, it's much more difficult for you know, hospitals in I would say in certain urban areas and things like that to be able to necessarily make lists like that, but doesn't mean they're not providing great care.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. And speaking of hospitals, Olivia, you just wrote about an expansion at a local hospital. Uh what's up with uh Baptist Health Floyd?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so over in New Albany, they're planning a more than $10 million expansion of their emergency department specifically. So like right now, they're looking at 70 beds combined of like the emergency department beds and then observation beds. So this expansion will actually add another 20 beds on, um, in addition to a new chapel. So um the whole construction is anticipated to be completed um by next year. So that'll be huge for um Baptist Health Floyd. And they have a few other projects going on too, like one in um Sellersburg, which looks like it's it's nearing completion, so it's near the Ivy Tech campus. Yeah, I remember that.
SPEAKER_02Um so Baptist Health, they're they're making some investments lately, it seems like. And Louisville really is only served by three healthcare systems, three big healthcare systems, right? It's Baptist, Norton, and University of Louisville, like you said.
SPEAKER_03So they're all nonprofit too, yeah. Which is rare.
SPEAKER_02Um, yeah, so um this isn't really, you know, a hospital uh at all, but I would say it's in the realm of healthcare, uh, healthcare research. Uh you also just wrote a story about U of L breaking ground on a new 27-acre uh innovation park. And the first piece of that is a bioscience research uh kind of facility. So tell us about that a little bit.
SPEAKER_03We've known about the innovation park for um over a year now, um, that that was happening. This is kind of our first details and look into it. The the BioCenter is a $70 million project um on the former Kentucky trailer park property, which if you are driving down Third Street near the uh can opener.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it's just past the can opener.
SPEAKER_03You look over towards the football stadium, yeah, as long as you're in a car and not a truck, yeah, you'll be able to see it. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02If you're in the truck, you're stuck there and you'll have plenty of time.
SPEAKER_03Um so it's gonna be a 70,000 square foot building uh constructed right on the northeast side of the property near the uh uh Speed School of Engineering. Uh but it's gonna be a custom design space. A lot of the innovation teams from Uval's uh Health Science Center and the Belling Up campus are gonna have labs there um with doing research from biosciences and engineering, uh computational science and disciplines like that. Uh it was help funded by uh Senator Mish McConnell. Um and they've uh UVL has partnered with uh Wex for Science and Technology, which is a development kind of firm that helps with these kind of projects um on the building.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. And uh yeah, that's uh seems like a lot of developments led by U of L around town. So this is this is one of those. And uh, you know, I don't know if we'll ever have a strong bioscience research uh center here in in Louisville, but uh you gotta take those steps.
SPEAKER_03So yeah, and I mean that is a growing um industry in Louisville because of uh in large part because of UPS health and the fact that you know a lot of these uh you know medical tests and things like that can um be flown into Louisville and flown out of very easily.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. And like um it's just such such a lucrative field, you know, of investment. Um that uh you even if you have a small, small uh kind of stake in that sector, you're you know, that's still gonna that's gonna bear out and and uh and make you know hopefully grow some businesses here in Louisville. So um all right. Well, with that, let's go ahead and take a break. We'll get a word from our sponsors, be right back, and we'll give you something to think about.
SPEAKER_00I'm Jim Allen, Vice Chair of Baird. For over a century, Louisville families have relied on Baird to provide customized financial solutions. In addition to wealth planning and trust services, Baird also offers extensive investment banking capabilities to clients ranging from large corporations to family-owned businesses. Finally, our public finance team provides valuable advice to municipalities, school districts, and academic institutions in need of capital. Yes, Louisville, Baird has you covered.
SPEAKER_02All right. Well, we wrap up the show uh by giving you one last thing to think about. So, Olivia, why don't you start us off? What's uh what's something we can think about?
SPEAKER_01So happy Ted Lasso is so back day or week to everyone who's celebrating. Basically, Ted Lasso is the show about a guy who goes to the UK to coach soccer. And they just revived um for season four. So Ted is now going to coach the women's soccer team. And I think this season it's really interesting with the timing because Steve just wrote a story on racing's attendance and the importance of getting butts in those seats. And right now, I mean, they're looking at less than 5,400 people at each game. So I'm curious to see whether this season of Ted Lasso will actually inspire people to go to racing games. Yeah. And I think they should. I love going to those games.
SPEAKER_02I started going to so much soccer after Ted Lasso the first three seasons of Ted Lasso. Like it just became like, oh man, I gotta get into soccer. I gotta become a soccer hooligan.
SPEAKER_01That's what happened to me. The second I moved here, I was like, oh my gosh, they have soccer here. Wait a minute. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Uh yeah, I hope so. You know, it's been a dire situation with racing and getting people there. I've been to some sad racing games over the years, but uh I got tickets uh next week, I think. So hopefully people will be out there. You're just hoping. Um, all right, uh Joel, uh, you want to give us something to think about?
SPEAKER_03All right, this has nothing to do with business. Uh something that's been bugging me for the last week or so, and I want to get your all's take on this. And I guess the question is, do you grow into your name? Or is your name something that just like is the I guess the opposite of that? Do you is your is your name something that just kind of like encompasses you? And that this is why I'm I'm I'm I'm bringing this up. So I walk in, I was gone all last week. I was in New York City at a a a training, part of uh the community ravage program, and walk in the first morning, and there's a few journalists sitting at tables. We had nameplates, and I'm looking around for my name, and this guy goes, Are you Joel? And I'm like, Yeah, he's like, Oh, you're over here next to me. He's like, You look like a Joel. That's why I said that. I was like, Okay, cool. The guy in front of him goes, Oh yeah, you look like the quintessential Joel. Absolutely. I've never met these people. First time, first interaction with any of these people. And the the woman sitting who eventually was sitting next to me, she goes, Oh yeah, you do look like a Joel. I have a friend, um, he's like a 65-year-old man. He's bald with a graying beard. It's absolutely a Joel. So I'm trying to figure out is that just by my just becoming a Joel? Or did I uh yeah, am I growing up something to grow into? Like, do you grow into a David? Like, you know, all of a sudden you just kind of encompass it like you're just like other Davids. This would be a great question for Steve Schmidt. Oh, yeah. He did on Steve Schmidt's lookup on I am Steve Schmidt, and they all did seem pretty similar.
SPEAKER_01I've watched I am Steve Schmidt all episodes, took notes and everything, and they all reminded me of each other.
SPEAKER_02So I'm like, yeah, trying to figure that out. I think if you have a really cool name like that that is part of your personality at some point, so like cultural, yeah. Yeah, or like yeah, and yeah, uh yeah, that's a great example. Like, there are names that are just like okay. So, yeah, good, good, good question. That is a quintessential something to think about there. Uh all right, I'll give you something. I'll give you something to think about. Yeah, we're gonna go next with that. Yeah, how do I transition that theater X? The uh long time adult bookstore. Did they really sell books? Uh uh I guess they did back in the 70s or something. Um back when that was all they had. But uh yeah, the uh Theater X, I think this is the end of the Theater X saga that Olivia reported about this week. Um you know, this is an adult theater that used to be located far away from Louisville, but Louisville just kind of grew in around it, especially, you know, it's in Clarksville, so Clarksville kind of grew in around it. And when I was a young reporter at News and Tribune, I covered Clarksville's many, many efforts to try and close Theater X. And uh, you know, every once in a while a TV news station would go in there with an investigative, you know, journalists, what's going on here? Um why are there holes in the wall? Stuff like that. Um so uh, you know, that would that was it was always this like longstanding thing. And I think this is the end of the Theater X saga because uh you reported Olivia this week that uh Theater X is the the building is for sale. I guess it closed a while back and I just didn't know that, but not keeping tabs. Yeah, I wasn't really paying attention, but came in the tip one. Yeah, yeah. Uh so yeah, we basically were like, it's for sale. And then we were like, is it closed? And like, yeah, apparently it closed a while ago. So yeah. Um yeah, so I guess you know, if you're if you're looking for a piece of property around Clarksville, Clarksville's been wanting something else there forever. It is actually zoned for adult businesses, which is really weird.
SPEAKER_03Clarksville's not just trying to buy themselves.
SPEAKER_02Well, you know, I think I can't remember specifically, but I think they came up with this zoning as a means. It was one of their many attempts to get get rid of this business or zone them, zone them out or zone out these kind of businesses. Um and uh and that's why it's zoned that. I would think whoever's gonna buy it is gonna probably knock down this building and um and try and change the zoning. It is right next to the interstate, it's kind of uh kind of back from the interstate, so I don't know what the the development potential is, but uh, but yeah, end of an era there for uh for travelers of I-65. And it was always like you were saying, Joel, you know, they they put up such a fight, you know, they they would be as as big a pain in the ass to Clarksville as they possibly could. Um they had a billboard that said the pride of Clarksville or something like that. I heard, and this is before my time even covered it, but at one point they had a drive-in theater, an adult movie drive-in theater, which seems just audacious. That's absurd. Yeah, but uh anyway, end of an era. If you want to know more about the building, um uh we have a story up on our website, I'll link to it. But um, I guess that's it. So um uh if you like what you hear, uh please consider subscribing to the Access Louisable Podcast on any of the popular podcast services, including Apple or Spotify. Thank you very much, Olivia and Joel. Thank you, Baird, for the support, and uh we'll see you guys next time. Bye-vulk, you're gonna be a very good thing.