D.C. officials broke ground on a long-delayed convention center hotel with officials from Marriott Wednesday.
The $520 million Washington Marriott Marquis Hotel is slated to open in spring 2014. It will have almost 1,200 rooms and 46 suites and will be one of only four Marriott Marquis properties in the country.
The hotel has been a missing piece of an economic puzzle to draw more and bigger conventions, competing both worldwide and with the Washington suburbs, city leaders said.
At the groundbreaking Wednesday, Mayor Adrian Fenty said the project would create 1,600 construction jobs and more than 1,000 hotel jobs once it opens.
The D.C. government and the Washington Convention and Sports Authority are covering $206 million of the development price tag.
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