Drury adds 180 rooms west of Chicago
Drury Hotels announced on 17 September 2026 that the Drury Plaza Hotel Joliet is under construction at 1351 Gateway Boulevard in Joliet, Illinois. The release carries a St. Louis dateline. The property takes reservations for August 2027 and beyond.
The building holds 180 guest rooms and 1,200 square feet of flexible meeting space that the release states accommodates up to 120 attendees. Drury runs more than 150 hotels in 30 states.
The daytime spaces the property carries
The amenity list names an indoor pool and spa, 24-hour business and fitness centers, free on-site parking and a Guest Market with 24-hour coffee service. The Kitchen + Bar serves off the lobby late each night.
The pool, the fitness centre, the business centre and the 1,200-square-foot meeting room are the property's daytime-usable spaces. Drury publishes no hourly or day-use programme, no daytime rate and no day-use listing for the Joliet building. The release states the guest offer for overnight stays.
The block around the site
The hotel sits inside Rock Run Collection, a 310-plus acre mixed-use development at the I-55 and I-80 interchange. Cullinan Properties, the developer, lists 450-plus hotel rooms planned across multiple brands on the site, so the Drury building carries 180 of them.
Hollywood Casino Joliet anchors the development. Cullinan lists the casino at 166,000 square feet with 10,000 square feet of convention space, projects more than one million annual visitors and 500-plus on-site team members, and puts the residential build within 10 miles at more than 7,500 units with an average household income above $100,000. The same page records traffic on I-55 and I-80 at more than 230,000 vehicles a day and a new interchange off I-55 at Route 59.
The casino's visitor projection and the residential build give the district a daytime and evening population from the year the hotel opens.
What the group terms say
Meeting business books through Drury's Meetings with More programme. The release states three terms: no food and beverage minimums, Wi-Fi in the meeting rooms for every attendee, and a flexible cancellation policy. A group can apply part of its fee to a future event at another Drury property.
The 1,200 square feet of meeting space is the only flexible space the release publishes. It carries no boardroom count, no breakout count and no second room.
The opening window and the labour line
Drury states that the hotel will employ approximately 50 full-time and part-time team members once open, and that recruitment and key hires in the Joliet market will run as construction continues. The company states it has been family-owned and operated since 1973, and holds a 2026 J.D. Power ranking as the number one upscale hotel brand for guest satisfaction.
What to confirm before pricing a daytime block
The release publishes no development cost, no contractor and no architect. It publishes no check-in or check-out time.
Ask the property for the room-release window between check-out and check-in, for the pool and spa hours, and for whether the meeting room takes a half-day booking. The building opens in 2027. The daytime product is not on the record.