THE SOUND Of EXPANSION

The Rhode Island Convention Center and Providence Place have been linked with a Skybridge, creating a single focal point in the state's capital city.

The 184-foot-long bridge is fully covered, carpeted and climate controlled.

Providence Place has more than 165 retail stores, an eight-level parking garage that holds up to 4,500 cars, a 16-screen movie theater, an IMAX Theater and seven full-service restaurants.

Jim McCarvill, executive director for the Rhode Island Convention Center Authority, said the Skybridge gives convention-goers a very convenient retail opportunity. "It also overlooks Providence's Waterplace Park, and it has extended the meetings and entertainment zone from downtown to the State House," McCarvill said.

A total of 41,000 square feet of space will be added to the Crowne Plaza Hotel at the Crossings in Warwick, R.I., including a new ballroom, a three-story rotunda, pre-function and exhibit space and three additional meetings rooms.

Also part of the addition will be storage space, telecommunications support and a kitchen expansion. When the expansion is completed this summer, there will be 22,300 square feet of new function space, bringing the hotel's total such space to about 34,000 square feet.

This effort is the third component in a multi-phase plan to develop the nearly 80-acre Crowne Plaza site. The first phase upgraded the former Holiday Inn at the Crossings to the Crowne Plaza in November 1998. Phase Two constructed two Little League Baseball fields. Additional phases call for construction of 84 more guest rooms and suites, beginning this spring, resulting in a total of 350 rooms. Another hotel and a nine-hole executive golf course also are planned.

"Increasing demand for small to mid-sized meetings and conventions that seek an alternative to the Boston metropolitan hotels resulted in the expansion of our meeting and banquet space, as well as guest-room inventory," said J. Rudi Heater, general manager.

The hotel is located about three miles from Providence TF Green Airport and a planned Amtrak Station. It is about nine miles from downtown Providence.