Update on the North Dakota Lodging Industry -- The Bakken, North Dakota, USA

Link here to the Minot Daily Press.

Hotels, like corn kernels, will pop up everywhere when the oil is hot.

Across the booming Bakken Field, the hotel industry is building from Williston to Minot.

Souris Valley Suites in Minot opened an 89-unit building in south Minot in July and broke ground for a 47-room expansion a month later. Manager Terry Alexander said the notion to expand came about halfway through the original construction when calls for reservations revealed the demand in the market. It's a demand that's not going away anytime soon, he said.

"This is all really still in the infancy stage," Alexander said of the oil activity. "As long as that continues, the need is going to be here."

Catering to oil, construction and other long-term stay guests, Souris Valley Suites' management company plans to break ground in Williston on a hotel soon.

Statewide, the number of rooms increased from 15,207 in 2009 to 15,539 in 2010, and again to 16,221 in 2011. By the end of 2012, those numbers will have increased significantly again, said Wendy Howe, director of the Minot Convention & Visitors Bureau. Minot currently has about 1,900 rooms, having added about 300 rooms in the last couple of years, she said. The average occupancy rate of 86 percent runs well ahead of the 60 percent nationally.

These figures do not include temporary housing, I assume.