ENGINEERING ASCE 2014

education they were having, what their turnout was,” Rushing said, “and to look at the city and see if that would fit our needs. And then, what it was going to be like planning a meeting in a Latin American country.” The visit went well, and soon ASCE signed

off on Panama City for its 2014 conference. This past April, Rushing returned to Panama for her first formal site visit, which included meetings with officials at ACP, who will be partnering with ASCE on the conference, and whose administra- tor, Jorge Luis Quijano, will serve as honorary chair. For obvious reasons, the canal will be a centerpiece of the meeting — hosting tours and site inspections, providing fodder for education sessions and historical presentations, offering its expansion as a case study of a “gigaproject” in progress, and more. But ASCE isn’t meeting in the Panama Canal,

it’s meeting in Panama. And it will be doing so at an interesting time in the country’s development as an international meeting destination. ATP is in the process of overhauling its convention and visitors bureau, which, according to Viscasillas, has never actually had any employees. In its place, ATP has launched a six-person pilot team called DMO Panama, modeled on North American– and European-style CVBs. “The idea is to have a public-private partnership, just like the ones in the United States and Canada,” Viscasillas said, “and create a structure that’s needed for Panama — sales, marketing, services.”

Along with that, the country is upgrading its

Lock and Key The Panama Canal is available for site inspec- tions and tours — including of the Pacific-side Pedro Miguel locks.

meetings infrastructure, adding hotels in down- town Panama City and breaking ground on a new, $193.7-million convention center situated on the Amador Causeway, at the Pacific Ocean entrance to the canal. At 570,000 square feet, with a 150,000-square-foot exhibit hall and a 2,000-per- son amphitheater, the new complex — scheduled to open next year — will be several times bigger than Panama’s aging Atlapa Convention Center. And the 4-million-square-foot Biomuseo, a bio- diversity museum designed by Frank Gehry, will open later this year on a site that’s adjacent to the new convention center. “A lot is happening in Panama,” Viscasillas said. “The present administration has made a commit- ment to the tourism industry, and especially to the convention industry, to make Panama a center of international conferences.”

62 PCMA CONVENE SEPTEMBER 2013 PCMA.ORG