The developers behind the new Ritz-Carlton Dove Mountain had a different chain and a bigger resort in mind when they started plotting their first Tucson hotel venture in the late 1990s.
Cottonwood Properties of Tucson and Scottsdale-based Greenbrier Southwest Corp. were planning a 500-room Hyatt hotel in the Dove Mountain master-planned community northwest of Tucson.
The hotel was designed and the developers received a verbal commitment for the financing on Sept. 10, 2001.
The world changed the next day, of course, after the terrorist attacks on the East Coast. Travel and tourism was grounded. The idea for the Hyatt was shelved.