GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — The riverfront Acrisure Amphitheater wrapped up its first concert season in Grand Rapids with more than 400,000 people through the gates, and venue figures show about a third of them came from beyond the greater Grand Rapids area.
The amphitheater hosted 50 public shows plus a number of private bookings. Experience Grand Rapids tracked 40 of those event nights and found that hotel occupancy climbed on 30 of them, with the biggest jump reaching 59%.
A joint city-county body, the Convention/Arena Authority, owns the $184 million venue, which sits on the Grand River at the south end of downtown.
Its debut year also brought a legal fight. Neighbors who say the shows are far too loud sued, and in August a Kent County judge ruled the venue must follow the city noise ordinance, which generally caps sound at 55 to 62 decibels and drops 7 decibels after 10 p.m.
City leaders want to restore the venue’s exemption. Commissioners take up the proposal on Tuesday, Oct. 27. Under it, concerts could go on until 11 p.m. free of the ordinance’s decibel caps, with volume governed by the venue’s special land use permit instead.
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