The Salina Journal from Salina, Kansas • Page 25

Air-conditioned A second floor of rooms takes shape at the Mid- America Inn near the interchange. New lodgings The Ala-Mar Inn is almost complete on the northwest corner of the 1-135 and Crawford interchange, next to a new Fina truck stop at bottom of picture. (Journal Photos) Motels grow to meet expected demand created by BiCenter By Julie Curran One spawned the other. The Salina Bicentennial Center. Motel expansion in the city.

Voters approved the $6.5 million con- entertainment, and sports center in 1976 and its construction subsequently began in late 1977 with a target opening date of June 1979. The year 1978 was destined to be a year of Journal will expand plant to the north Joining the list of Salina institutions planning expansions in 1979 is The Salina Journal. Fred Vandegrift, president of The Salina Journal, said the newspaper will add more than 6,000 square feet of warehouse space and support facilities to its plant on South 4th Street. The warehouse will store The Journal's newsprint rolls and also provide warehousing for products offered by the Consolidated Printing and Stationery The Journal's wholly-owned Salina office supply and printing firm. "The Journal has acquired the four properties north of its present site," Vandegrift said.

"The total area now extends from the footbridge across the Smoky Hill River at South Street north to Mulberry and east to the alley between 4th and 3rd." Making way One house already has been removed and three more will be razed to make way for the warehouse addition which will extend the newspaper's plant north toward Mulberry. "The real estate purchase also provides room for future expansion," Vandegrift said. The warehouse area will continue to be served by the present railroad siding where cars of newsprint are unloaded. But a new truck dock will be developed for receiving trucked supplies and for dispatch of the daily editions of the newspaper. The dock will be reached from both 4th Street and Mulberry trances.

The area also will hold street parking spaces to add to Journal employee parking on the west side of 4th. Second expansion This is The Journal's second expansion since the newspaper moved to the riverside site in 1962. Several years ago, expansion of the press to a 64-page capacity brought addition of a new mailing room from which the newspapers are dispatched. Design of the addition is by Wilson and Engineers and Architects, Salina. Vandegrift said construction is expected to begin in early spring.

Nuke power a saving PARSIPPANY, N.J. (UPI) Two nuclear-powered electric generating plants saved four million residents of New Jersey and Pennsulvania between $55 and $200 million on their 1977 electric bills, says Robert C. Arnold. Arnold is vice president of the utilities company that owns the plants. He says the savings represent the difference between the fuel cost of generating electricity with nuclear energy on the one hand and coal or oil on the other.

If the output of the two nuclear plants, owned by General Public Utilities had been replaced by electricity generated with coal, Arnold said, customer electric bills would have increased about $60 million. If oil had been used instead of nuclear power, he added, customer bills would have been up about $200 million for the year. development in the area of overnight accommodations facilities. And it was. Two new motels began to rise facilities which added a total of 136 new rooms for Salina's visitors.

And other motels expanded to make available 44 additional rooms, according to a local developer, Harry Steele. Steele said Motel 7, a new 82-unit budget motel being built on the northwest corner of the inter- change, is scheduled for completion in May. The ownership Bruce Roberts, Bill Graves, C.L. Clark, Larry Marshall and the H.W. Steele Trust No.

1 is the same group which owns the Coachlight Inn on the southwest corner of the interchange. Another new motel the Ala Mar Inn, 2020 W. Crawford will add 54 rooms when it's completely finished in February. Sixteen new rooms were added to the Flamingo Motel, 500 E. Pacific, during 1978.

During 1979, more motels will complete additions. The Best Western Mid- America Inn, 1846 N. 9th, is adding 12 rooms. The Howard Johnson Motel, across from the Mid State Mall, is adding 16 rooms. "We feel the motel industry is very important to Salina," Steele said.

"It's fresh money into the city. The Bicentennial Center will attract the traveling public and we feel there'll be a need for more rooms." A "bed tax" ordinance which provides for a two percent surcharge on the motel bills of overnight guests here was adopted shortly before 1978 began. The tax funds are used to pay the Salina Area Chamber of Commerce's tour- ism promotion expenses. The main impetus again comes from the Bicentennial Center, but the funds are used to promote tourism citywide, not just within the confines of the Bicentennial Center. A contract between the city commission and the Chamber provides for the Chamber to act as an independent contractor, providing the tourism promotion service for the city.

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