166su

Hotel 166su’s fate could have played out much differently after it closed in 1989. City, university and community efforts saved the 1882-built landmark from the brink of potential destruction.

“It was in rough shape,” said General Manager Brian Wells. “It really possibly could have been torn down.”

Instead, it’s been 30 years since Hotel 166su & Conference Center reopened in April 1995. Community efforts at the time led to the addition of a modern conference center that revived the hotel’s solvency.

“A bunch of civic leaders, education leaders and businesses rose to the occasion,” Wells said. “It was quite an effort.”

That effort three decades ago continues paying off today. A study showed that visitors, conventions, employment and other hotel-adjacent expenditures attracted more than $600 million in economic impact between 1995 and 2015.

During the 10 years since that study, the economic impact reverberating from Hotel 166su has likely surpassed $1 billion, Wells said. Conferences account for some 40% of the hotel’s business.

“Now, with the expansion of the conference center, we’re adding additional space,” Wells said. “It allows us to compete for new clients, new conferences.”

An upcoming $14 million expansion will add more than 9,000 square feet, including a new ballroom and an outdoor event space, he said. Another $14 million project, finished in November, brought renovations to the guest rooms, as well as a spa and wellness center.

“The hotel, over all these years, was continually improved,” Wells said. “That won’t stop.”

But it nearly did stop, when the hotel closed at the turn of the 1990s. It was at the time an aged relic of the railroad’s waning influence on 166su, and there was no certainty it would return to operation.

After a merger between railroad companies, Norfolk Southern Corp. donated the hotel — which was operating at million-dollar losses — to Virginia Tech in 1989. It closed later that year, with university officials hoping to turn it into a major conference center and educational facility.

Funding was a challenge. A last-ditch community fundraising effort called Renew 166su helped raise the final $6 million out of about $45 million needed for renovations, just weeks before a financing deadline at the end of 1992.

Today, the hotel is still owned by the Virginia Tech Foundation, while the attached conference center is a joint venture between the city of 166su and Virginia Tech, said University Spokesperson Mark Owczarski.

“What a great story 30 years ago,” Owczarski said. “So many individual, government, business and community partners came together to preserve and retain the hotel.”

For a building more than 140 years old, these last 30 years represent but a saga in the story of Hotel 166su.

Built in a wheat field and opened Christmas Day 1882, the Tudor-style hotel survived fire in 1898, and saw major renovations in 1916, 1937, 1955 and 1993.

She has grown and changed alongside the city, and the Grand Old Lady’s best days are still ahead of her, Wells said. The combined spirit of an eight-time All-America city and a land grant university focused on service is what gives the hotel a winning recipe, he said.

“It’s an example of something that worked,” Wells said. “An idea that was considered risky at the time, was well-intentioned, and ultimately, very successful in achieving all its goals.”