What is Home2 Suites Scottsdale Salt River?
It’s half of a building. Home2 Suites by Hilton Scottsdale Salt River shares a four-story hotel on Pima Center Parkway with Tru by Hilton Scottsdale Salt River: one lobby, one pool, two brands. Home2 is the extended-stay side, with suites that have kitchen appliances. Tru is the simpler, cheaper side, with standard rooms. The pair held their grand opening in February 2020, weeks before the pandemic stopped travel, and have spent the years since quietly filling with spring-training families, contractors on long jobs and visitors to the Talking Stick district.
The address says Scottsdale. The land says otherwise. Pima Center lies between Pima Road and the Loop 101, on the Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Community, a sovereign nation. More specifically, it’s on land held by individual Community members rather than by the Community as a whole. When the hotel opened, the Community noted that roughly 30 to 35 member landowners own the ground beneath it and lease it for development.
The suites are what you’d expect from the brand: room to spread out, a kitchen setup with microwave, refrigerator and dishwasher, free breakfast, free parking and free Wi-Fi. The location is better than a business park sounds. Arizona’s first White Castle is next door, Spinato’s at The Block is a short walk, and OdySea Aquarium and Butterfly Wonderland are just across the 101. Salt River Fields and Talking Stick Resort are a few minutes south.
How to stay at Home2 right
Choose Home2 over Tru for anything longer than a weekend. The pool and lobby are shared, so the only real difference is the room. Kitchen appliances pay for themselves by the third night.
Walk to dinner. The Block at Via de Ventura and Pima Center Parkway has Spinato’s, the Arizona family pizzeria known for Chicago tavern-style thin crust and its spinach pie. White Castle is next door. Beyond that, the district’s chain restaurants are a short drive away.
Use the location for the kids. OdySea Aquarium and Butterfly Wonderland are across the freeway, and Great Wolf Lodge’s indoor waterpark is a little farther south on Pima. In summer, when nothing outdoors works after 10 a.m., that cluster of air-conditioned attractions is the reason to stay here.
Plan spring training like a local. Salt River Fields is a few minutes’ drive south. Cactus League weeks fill this hotel, so book early. Park at the Pavilions or the casino garage and walk to the gates, as the neighborhood regulars do.
Bring the dog, within limits. Up to two pets are allowed for a fee, with a weight cap.
Use the free parking. Parking is free and the 101 is right there. North Scottsdale and the Airpark are a short drive up the freeway, and Old Town is about fifteen minutes southwest.
Built on members’ land
Most visitors assume that “reservation land” means land owned by a tribe. On the Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Community, much of it is more complicated. Alongside land held by the Community as a whole, many parcels are held by individual members and their families, a legacy of the federal allotment era. Development on those parcels needs the agreement of the landowners as well as the Community and the federal Bureau of Indian Affairs.
Pima Center is a case study in getting that done. The 209-acre business park near the Loop 101 and Via de Ventura was developed by Main Spring Capital Group and is described as one of the first large commercial projects built on individually held land within the Community. Assembling the land took more than two years and approvals from the BIA, the City of Scottsdale, the federal government, the Community and the individual owners, along with a design palette meant to respect the land and the Community’s culture. Corporate tenants arrived during the 2010s; Plexus Worldwide opened its headquarters there in 2015.
Then came the consumer side. In October 2019 White Castle opened its first Arizona restaurant at Via de Ventura and Pima Center Parkway — at about 4,600 square feet, the largest in the chain’s history at the time — and The Block filled in with restaurants. The Home2 and Tru followed months later. At the hotel’s grand opening, the Community’s development director, Stacey Gubser, welcomed the new business on behalf of the Tribal Council and thanked the landowners who had made it possible.
That thank-you is the real story of the building. The casino and the ballpark get the headlines, but much of the Community’s frontage is built the way this hotel was: member families leasing their land, parcel by parcel, to national brands, and earning from it. For a guest it means a clean suite near the aquarium. For the landowners it means income from land their families have held for generations, on terms they agreed to.