What once was an ambitious but abandoned expansion of Downtown Los Angeles’ Convention Center and Marriott Hotel has found a second life courtesy of a new proposal backed by a slate of big-name firms, according to a report from Urbanize LA. 

Project renderings are emerging of a plan that would greatly enhance the existing site where a failed plan called Farmer’s Field had previously imagined a renewed site anchored by a professional football arena which later became the basis for SoFi Stadium. 

Populous is in charge of the new site plan that calls for a total expansion of around 700,000 square feet (a 45% increase in the Convention Center’s total size) in the form of new multipurpose meeting spaces, an exhibition hall, parking garage, and pedestrian-friendly interventions along Pico Boulevard and Chick Hearn Court.

The expansion also includes significant improvements to the adjacent Gilbert Lindsey Plaza to be overseen by Olin.

A new 37-story tower is also in the works from Gensler that would make the entire complex the second-largest hotel accommodation in the state of California once completed. 

If approved, the plan would significantly boost business development prospects in an area which has been severely impacted by COVID-19. The project is expected to cost at least $1.8 billion by last estimates. Urbanize says the construction period would take three years to complete from beginning to end.