Some Columbus area business owners may be smiling when the 2011 Maneuver Conference ends today at the Columbus Convention & Trade Center.

Peter Bowden, president of the Columbus Convention & Visitor’s Bureau, said his office is estimating an economic impact of about $224,000 for the three-day conference that started Monday.

The event attracted almost 4,000 visitors, including about 3,000 soldiers from the Armor School and Infantry School at Fort Benning and soldiers from throughout the world. There were also about 900 exhibitors that set up 235 displays inside and around the Trade Center, marketing everything from survival knives to the $750,000 MaxxPro Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicle parked along Front Avenue.

Staff Sgt. Giovanni Melendez, who moved from the Armor School at Fort Knox, Ky., six weeks ago, said he has enjoyed the conference in downtown. It has given him a chance to see more of the city. 

“I never knew this was the center here,” said Melendez, 36. “All I knew was the Civic Center.”
For lunch, Melendez said he enjoyed some barbecue at Mike & Ed’s Bar-B-Q in Phenix City