Indonesia Capital Races To Add Lodging Facilities

<H1>Indonesia Capital Races To Add Lodging Facilities</H1><H2>Jakarta Undergoes Building Spree</H2><H3>By Judy Jacobs</H3><I>Jakarta</I> - Indonesia's two largest cities are in the midst of a hotel building spree that doesn't seem to have an end. Jakarta, the country's capital, and Surabaya (see sidebar), its most important industrial center, are opening or have plans to open an unprecedented number of new hotels in the next few years. These hotels will dramatically increase the lodging options for business travelers, who make up about 90 percent of all visitors to Jakarta and a similar percentage to Surabaya.

"There are numerous hotels either currently under construction or on the drawing board for Jakarta-some of which may or may not materialize," said David Hall, executive director of the recently established Jakarta Convention Bureau.

At last count late last year, there were 16,000 three-, four- and five-star hotel rooms scheduled for Jakarta between 1996 and mid-1998, Hall said. "We currently have about 9,500 such rooms in the city," he said.

A host of major hotel groups are poised for action on the Jakarta hotel scene. Accor will be the most active, with three new properties being developed in addition to the five it already operates in the city. Two of these hotels will be located in Chinatown, the site of many wholesale businesses and a new area of the city slated for hotel development.

The first of the Accor hotels, the 204-room Ibis Mangga Dua, is set to open in early 1997 on Jalan Mangga Dua Abdad in Chinatown. Facilities will include a business center and function rooms. The company will open another Chinatown property, the 243-room Novotel Gajah Mada, in 1998 and the 163-room Mercure Grand Hotel Mahakam in the southern part of the city at the end of that year. Facilities will include a business center, health club, pool, meeting rooms and a ballroom.

Meanwhile, Thailand's Dusit Hotel group, which operates properties in Thailand, Nepal and Balikpapan, Indonesia, will join Accor in Chinatown with its new 350-room Dusit Mangga Dua, which is scheduled to begin receiving guests May 1.

The hotel incorporates a 50-room Dusit Executive Club section, two restaurants, a nightclub, a business center and a health club. Meeting facilities will include a 6,400-square-foot ballroom that can be divided into two equal sections and four meeting rooms ranging in size from 320 to 1,830 square feet.

Although Sheraton operates hotels in Bali and several secondary cities around the country, the company will open its first Jakarta property, the 356-room Sheraton Media Hotel & Towers, Jakarta, in September. The room count will include 34 suites and 60 Towers rooms and suites. Hotel facilities will include a Thai, Chinese and Japanese restaurant; a business center, swimming pool, two tennis courts and a health club with gym, spa and massage facilities.

For meetings, the property will feature a ballroom accommodating up to 250 people for banquets and 460 for receptions, two function rooms accommodating between 100 and 200 people each and four boardrooms.

Sheraton also is managing the Jakarta Airport Hotel, which is scheduled to open in June. Although geared toward airline passengers in transit, the hotel is designed like a resort, with landscaped grounds, a swimming pool, three tennis courts and a health club. The property also features a business center, seven meeting rooms and three boardrooms.

Kempinski Hotels plans to enter the Indonesian market with the Kempinski Hotel The Plaza Jakarta, which will be located on Jalan Sudirman in the city's central business district. Set to open in late 1997, the 350-room hotel will be part of a mixed-use high-rise building that includes 260 luxury condominiums on its upper floors. The property Kempinski Hotel will include a swimming pool, a health center, banquet facilities and a business center.

Another hotel coming up in the central business district is the 450-room Westin Jakarta, scheduled to open Jan. 1, 1998 as part of a mixed-used office, hotel and retail development complex.

Looking further ahead, Marriott plans to manage a group of hotels throughout the country in a joint venture project with Gunung Sewu, a major Indonesian company. Construction on the first of these hotels, the 400-room J.W. Marriott Jakarta in the downtown district, began in 1993 and is scheduled to be completed in 1999.

Choice Hotels, which in December opened the Clarion Sun Lake all-suite hotel in Jakarta's business district, is building another Clarion hotel in the city. The property, located downtown, is scheduled to open late next year. "The economy in Indonesia is growing," said Roy Murray, vice president of Choice's international division. "The country is not a mature market for hotels, so there is huge demand.