TAMPA, Fla. — The JW Marriott hotel in Tampa’s Water Street District is getting closer to completion.
“This is very exciting to bring Tampa’s first luxury hotel,” said Marriott and JW Marriott hotel General Manager Ron McAnaugh.
ABC Action News got an exclusive look at the construction progress.
The hotel will have 519 rooms and 100,000 square feet of event space including the largest hotel ballroom in Tampa Bay at 30,000 square feet.
There will also be retail on the first floor, restaurants, a large roof top bar and a spa.
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“We’re able to bring in a spa by JW, which will have 10 treatment rooms. It will have ladies’ and men’s waiting areas as far as locker rooms. It will have a plunge pool and be really a place for people to come and get a retreat,” said McAnaugh.
The project will add more than 400 new jobs to Tampa Bay.
With all the new amenities, hotel owners hope to attract locals and visitors.
The JW Hotel will be the headquarter hotel for the 2021 Superbowl.
With so much event space, McAnaugh says the hotel will be able to draw in larger crowds for big events than ever before.
“That brings groups that couldn’t look at Tampa before because we didn’t have enough space or enough inventory to keep them in one complex so it just opens us up to a whole new spectrum of business,” said McAnaugh.
Project leaders say the hotel is designed to become the center of activity.
This is all part of the bigger Water Street Tampa project that’s considered one of the largest master plans in the country and is expected to draw in 23,000 people every day.
Construction is supposed to wrap up sometime next fall.
