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Go-carts, bumper boats make way for new hotels

The fun and games are over at Celebration Station as its parent company brings 274 rooms to travelers.

By ANDREW MEACHAM
Published June 9, 2006

Celebration Station, the place where children go for fun and games, lies in tangled ruins. A pair of gleaming new hotels on the southwest corner of State Road 60 and Falkenburg Road will take its place.

Whiteco Industries, the property owner and parent company to Celebration Station, has erected the outer structure for a seven-story Homewood Suites.

Work on an eight-story Embassy Suites will begin after workers finish clearing away the debris from Celebration Station.

The developer began submitting paperwork in late 2000 to the county's Planning and Growth Management Department. The Indiana company had to obtain permission to rezone the 16.5 acres, modifying the use of the property from a recreation facility to a hotel.

A Courtyard Mariott and a Fairfield Inn already stand south of the property.

County commissioners in 2004 approved Whiteco's request to change two buildings' height from five and 10 stories to seven and eight stories.

The Homewood Suites will cater to business travelers and offer breakfast daily and complimentary evening meals Mondays through Thursdays, Hilton Hotels spokeswoman Janella Loaiza said.

Prices range from $59 to $329 a night nationwide. Homewood guests typically stay two weeks.

The Homewood Suites will offer 126 rooms, all of them suites. The Embassy Suites will have 148 rooms.

The demolition by WPM Construction, a sister company to Whiteco Industries, means the Celebration Station on U.S. 19 in Clearwater is now the only one in the Tampa Bay area.

[Last modified June 8, 2006, 13:45:26]