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DALLAS — Once known as the Dallas Convention Center, the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center has hosted Prince twice, Madonna once, and, during Queen’s first American tour, the British band filmed a music video there. In 1984, President Ronald Reagan accepted the Republican Party nomination for a second-term run during the GOP convention in the venue next to the Dallas City Hall. 

And, in times of crisis, the convention center has provided shelter for thousands relocated by hurricanes and winter storms, homelessness and this year, Central American youth migrants seeking asylum in the United States. 

What You Need To Know

  • The City of Dallas will hold a public meeting on Thursday, April 15 for public comment on the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center Master Plan

  • The meeting will allow the public to hear more details about the city’s plans to revitalize the convention center and the surrounding Convention District

  • The meeting will be held virtually. To register follow this link: bit.ly/kbhccd-meeting

The City of Dallas is proposing a master plan that its developers say will improve and enhance the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center and the downtown area surrounding it into “the #1 convention center and convention center urban district in the United States.”

To be sure, the convention center is already huge. The center’s 2 million square feet includes 1 million square feet of exhibit space, a 9,816-seat arena, a 9,816-seat theater, and 3 ballrooms, according to its website.

The massive center, which was named after former U.S. Senator and now NATO Ambassador Hutchison in 2013, sits southwest of Dallas City Hall and is the center of what is known as the Convention District.

It is next to a historic graveyard, Pioneer Cemetary, which contains the graves of some of Dallas’ most notable founding families, as well as what was Dallas’ largest Confederate memorial, which the city dismantled last June. 

Thousands of tourists visit the Pioneer Plaza to the north of the convention center, where larger-than-life-sized Texas cowboys wrangle a herd of longhorn cattle in the largest bronze statue in the world.

The city in February began developing a master plan for revitalizing the Convention District, which proponents hope will breathe new life into the downtown area.

On Thursday, the Dallas City Hall will host a virtual public meeting in which city residents and stakeholders in the Convention Center area may listen to the proposal voice their opinions about the master plan. Anyone may join by registering at https://www.dallasconventioncenter.com/

After Thursday’s meeting, the city will make public the proposed master plan via a website.

As proposed, the master plan would produce four studies to include an in-depth look at the district’s area, a transportation study, a multimodal station study, and a marketing and funding analysis. The proposed master plan would be executed in a 10-year phased approach aimed at improving the area and the facility itself to generate revenue for Dallas.