With 1,000 new hotel rooms coming, See Monterey signals a need for community collaboration.

A hotel construction boom is underway in Monterey County, presenting both an opportunity and a challenge, says Rob O’Keefe, president and CEO of See Monterey. Done right, it could increase tourism revenue, already a $3 billion industry. Done wrong, new hotel rooms could “cannibalize” existing ones, he says.

It’s just one example of the opportunities and challenges facing Monterey County’s number-two industry, still not fully caught up to pre-pandemic levels. The industry has struggled under the weight of decreased foreign travel, bad weather and continual Highway 1 closures in Big Sur.

“We have a lot of work to do. We’ve got to gain lost ground and then some,” O’Keefe says. “We’re going to do a lot better if we’re working together as a community.”

To help navigate the way forward, See Monterey commissioned studies and research to create the Monterey County Tourism 2030 Roadmap, or MCT-2030. The plan predicts that tourism will create $18 billion in additional revenue, but stresses the need for “unprecedented community collaboration” to tackle challenges around transportation, housing, retail offerings and other community infrastructure.

Transportation opportunities/challenges are another example, with a new terminal sporting five gates under construction at Monterey Regional Airport. Once completed, possibly by 2026, it potentially means more visitors flying in, but the question remains how to get them around without cars, so as not to add to traffic. For that O’Keefe says they’re looking for collaboration between Monterey-Salinas Transit, the Transportation Agency for Monterey County and others.

MCT-2030 also emphasizes the symbiotic relationship between the community and tourism, which drives hotel and sales taxes to local governments to pay for services and infrastructure. One goal is to “enhance quality of place,” or creating a community that both visitors want to live in and tourists want to visit over and over again, O’Keefe says. It includes improving infrastructure, but could also include increased retail and entertainment experiences that could be enjoyed by both residents and visitors.

A “residential sentiment” survey conducted this year on behalf of See Monterey showed that most residents understand the importance of tourism to the economy. (Between 69 and 77 percent of respondents by city said they did.) Respondents indicated a strong preference for attracting environmentally conscious visitors.

Currently hotels are under construction in Pacific Grove (Kimpton), Sand City (Marriott) and Seaside (Hyatt), with more already approved. To fill them, O’Keefe uses the phrase rising tides lift all boats: “We’re going to a whole new level of tide.”

The bureau is working on opening new markets in the midwest – Sun Country Airlines did a test between MRY and Minneapolis that began Aug. 8 and ends Nov. 3 – as well as Europe, China and Japan. One goal is to pull visitors away from other California destinations like Napa and Palm Springs.