Three of the largest hotels on St. Thomas and St. John will
be closed for hurricane repairs until 2019, according to the USVI Hotel and
Tourism Association.
They are the 443-room Frenchman's Reef & Morning Star
Marriott Beach Resort and the 297-room Sugar Bay Resort & Spa in St. Thomas
and the 166-room Caneel Bay Resort in St. John.
Also closed until 2019 is the 36-room Flamboyan on the Bay
Resort & Villas in St. Thomas.
While projections for the 2017-2018 season indicate that most
resorts on St. Thomas and St. John will remain closed for renovations and
repairs, several properties on St. Croix are or will be open for guests. That
includes the Buccaneer, which reopens Nov. 1, and Club Comanche and the
Frederiksted Hotel, which now are open.
"The closure of the largest properties in the territory
at the same time is not ideal, but it presents opportunities for us to renovate
and update the tourism product. While the hotels focus on revealing a polished
new product, USVIHTA will continue to promote properties and members who came
out of the storms with minimal damage," Hamilton said.
The Department of Tourism plans to align marketing initiatives
with hotels as they reenter the marketplace, according to Beverly
Nicholson-Doty, commissioner of tourism.