Hotels Would Change Highfill?s Future Drastically

Before the Northwest Arkansas Regional Airport (XNA) moved in, Highfill was hardly noticed by citizens in the two-county area, much less by the folks at Rand McNally.

And aside from going to and coming from the airport, many business people don’t know anything else about the tiny Benton County town with a population of about 105.

But the general feeling is that as soon as five years down the road, many of those same businesspeople could be spending the night in Highfill.

The time is coming when there will be more beds at hotels in Highfill than there are people who actually live there.

XNA is on the eastern edge of Highfill, sitting just inside its city limits. Bentonville has annexed land along Arkansas Highway 12 on the north border.

The old stores at the south entrance to XNA have been closed for quite some time, and even the former general store/restaurant back in “downtown” Highfill has shut its doors.

But what a different look this area will have once a hotel or two begin lighting up their vacancy signs.

Dallas developer Michael Horn owns 249 acres of the land to the north of XNA. He has been making regular trips to the area lately and hopes to have an announcement soon regarding commercial plans there. It is believed a hotel would be first and foremost on that list. He has even stated that his “seven to 10-year plan” on what is known locally as The Old Farm would call for an office, retail and residential complex.

He hopes to build 10 restaurants, six hotels, eight office buildings, about 400 apartment units, two convenience stores, a bank, a daycare center and retail stores.

Ed Hendrix of Elm Springs owns much of the land just south of XNA. There likely will be future commercial development there, too, but with most business travelers frequenting Wal-Mart Stores Inc. to the north in Bentonville, hotels probably would be built north of XNA.

Leaders in the surrounding cities believe the eventual growth around Highfill will not hurt existing hotels in their towns, rather they will aid in the continual growth of Northwest Arkansas.

Perry Webb, president of the Springdale Chamber of Commerce, said growth in Highfill will help every community in the area.

“We are at the point where we don’t need to worry about what percentage of the pie we’re getting,” Webb said. “We just need to make the pie bigger. It’s really not us versus them, but it’s the region growing as a whole.”

Pat Harris, president of Harris McHaney Realtors in Rogers, said he remembers when Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport was built “out in the middle of nowhere.”

“That certainly didn’t take away anything from the hotels in Dallas,” Harris said. “I don’t think it would have a negative impact on anything around here if we have a few things pop up around [XNA]. I think it will just complement the surrounding towns.”

The Embassy Suites Hotel going up at Pinnacle Hills on Interstate 540 will be the showcase of hotels in the area. And there about eight more hotels just off the next two Rogers/Bentonville exits off I-540 to the north.

“If you don’t see growth, you won’t see folks coming in and spending millions of dollars to put up a hotel,” said Tom Ginn, vice president of community development for the Rogers-Lowell Area Chamber of Commerce.

“These hotel folks aren’t stupid. They’re going to want some rooms out there. The key now is business travel. We don’t have as many leisure travelers except for a certain time of the year. The bread and butter is the business traveler. They’ve got to stay some place.”

The biggest hold up on any development near the airport is the new road from XNA to I-540, which will be tied into the still-planned new bypass in Springdale that is still going through the route planning stages.

Scott Van Laningham, executive director of XNA, said the construction of the new road will spur development at XNA.

“I think when we see [the road] the development will take off.”

XNA hopes to eventually have hotels on its property, much like Tulsa and Dallas have.