Jan. 5--On gentle slopes and in jagged ruts of dirt, Bobby Little and Trent Lander see a steak restaurant, a winding river, a European spa and a Southwestern-style pool. 

It's starting to take less effort to help visitors in hardhats see it too, these days. 

The evidence of what's to come is everywhere at the future Gaylord Opryland Texas resort and convention center in Grapevine, from the glass workers installing panes on the main atrium's roof, to the employees digging out the future quarter-mile river that will run underneath. 

"There's a lot to visualize right now, but it's starting to take shape," said Mr. Lander, a project manager working on the $500 million endeavor. 

"Everything is starting to happen at the same time," said Mr. Little, a site superintendent. 

And everything is happening on time, if not a little bit ahead of schedule, said Robert McPherrin, vice president of sales and marketing for the hotel. Although the grand opening won't be until April 2004, 2003 is shaping up to be a busy year. 

Starting about 6 a.m., the construction site looks like a small city, as more than 1,000 workers drive in. Mr. Little said that later this year close to 2,000 people would be working on site. "We'll have 300 painters alone," he said. 

The Texas-themed hotel and convention center will sit on 150 acres at the tip of Grapevine Lake, with 1,500 rooms and 400,000 square feet of convention space. It's the third Gaylord Opryland project, following sites in Tennessee and Florida. 

Mr. McPherrin's staff is just as busy as the construction workers, booking conventions from the opening date to several years out, for companies including Harley Davidson, Chick-Fil-A and Barnes & Noble. Prospective clients can check out artist's color boards that detail carpets replete with Texas stars and cowboy boots. Future brides can book a 50,000-square-foot ballroom that could fit 3,999 of their closest friends for a $400,000 reception. 

"That's the largest ballroom in the state," said Mr. McPherrin, who has plenty of similarly startling statistics to demonstrate the building's mammoth size. 

About 3,000 truckloads of dirt were taken out of the site. 

About 1,100 truckloads of concrete were brought in. The site will have 44 elevators, more than 1 million square feet of carpet and 7,912 doorknobs. The fields of both Reliant Stadium and Minute Maid Park in Houston would fit in the main atrium. 

The city of Grapevine is excited about other numbers. The typical conventioneer spends $340 a day, said City Manager Roger Nelson. One company that booked a convention wants to rent an RV park the city recently acquired. 

Mayor William D. Tate said he would tour the construction site soon. "It's a substantial feature on the landscape now, a striking feature," he said. 

"We've seen it on pictures, we've seen it on blueprints, we've seen it in Florida and Nashville, but now we're going to see it ourselves with a Texas theme. ... I think it's the type of facility that any community in America would love to have built in their city." 

-----To see more of The Dallas Morning News, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.dallasnews.com. 

(c) 2003, The Dallas Morning News. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News. HDI, BKS, CNP, KO,