January 23, 2023

By Matthew Thibault

London-based contractor Balfour Beatty has won a contract to complete the 800-room Grand Hyatt Miami Beach Convention Center Hotel, according to a Jan. 17 press release shared with Construction Dive. 

Early site work at the property is now underway, with vertical construction anticipated to start this year and be completed in 2025. The cost of the project was not disclosed.

Plans for the hotel were originally approved in 2019 and construction was slated to start in 2020, according to the Real Deal, which pegged the project’s cost than at $362 million. 

South Florida developers Turnberry and Terra are spearheading the project. 

The Grand Hyatt Miami Beach Convention Center Hotel will give guests direct access to the city’s convention center. It will include 12 floors of guest rooms and 52 suites offering views of Miami Beach, according to the release. 

Additionally, there will be four floors of meeting spaces and ballrooms that will complement the convention center, a resort-style pool deck with panoramic views, a signature restaurant, a lobby lounge and bar, and limited retail space. An elevated sky bridge will enable event attendees to move between the hotel and the convention center.

The new project is another notch in the belt for the contractor, coming off a December in which it updated its guidance and said its performance would be better than it initially anticipated. 

The company has been busy with infrastructure builds in the past year, with seven projects on the West Coast worth $235 million combined, and the recent completion via a joint venture with Fluor of the $666 million Southern Gateway Project in Texas. 

The hotel represents a return to the company’s U.S. roots, which began in South Florida, said Scott Skidelsky, Balfour Beatty president in the Southeast, in the release.

“This is a beacon development for Miami Beach,” Skidelsky said.

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