A new 134-room hotel will be coming to Annapolis, filling one of the last vacant parcels of land in the city and boosting its hotel inventory for the first time in 15 years.
The Annapolis Planning Commission approved final plans for the project Thursday night. The move comes just as summer tourism and Commissioning Week at the U.S. Naval Academy are pushing demand for visitor accommodations and raising prices for rooms across the region.
“You guys are on your way now,” said Alex Pline, chair of the commission, after voting “yes” on a proposal that was four years in the making.
Attorney Alan Hyatt represented a team of developers who plan to construct a four-story building on what is now a gravel parking lot. The 2.55-acre triangle is the final piece of Park Place, a cluster of mixed-use buildings on West Street that was the city’s largest development ever when approved back in 2000. Notable Park Place features include two five-story office buildings, The Residences at Park Place condominiums and a Westin Hotel that opened in 2007.
The new hotel site is to the north of the original Park Place development, opposite the Annapolis Police Department headquarters, bordered to the south by the Loews Access Road and to the west by Taylor Avenue. The land was originally slated to become a surface parking lot, but the Park Place garage has proven sufficient, developers say in their application.
The city currently leases the hotel site as a temporary storage area for city public works materials and equipment.
This hotel should address room inventories issues in Annapolis.
Hyatt said his clients – locally based JBJ Management and XSS Hotels, a New Hampshire firm – conducted an extensive study before seeking permission to build the hotel, with an estimated construction budget of $25 million.
“My clients would not move forward if there wasn’t a need,” he said.
Although no name has been announced, Hyatt said the hotel will fall under the Marriott branding umbrella and offer a mix of non-luxury short-term rooms and extended-stay accommodations.
Lisa Minker, a city zoning enforcement officer, said the new Marriott property will be the first hotel built in the city since the Westin opened in 2007.
Much has changed in the travel industry since then, both locally and internationally. At least three hotels in the city have rebranded, including the former O’Callaghan’s becoming a Hilton Garden Inn and the Loew’s Hotel morphing into The Graduate. Both are offering rooms for $400 a night during Commissioning Week.
The city has an inventory of just 842 hotel rooms, according to the tourism organization Visit Annapolis & Anne Arundel County. Airbnb adds another 546 options for Annapolis visitors, although some of those are located as far west as Crownsville. The website reports that of those 546 “Annapolis” listings, fewer than two dozen are still available for May 25, two days before graduation at the Naval Academy. Hosts are charging up to $950 a night even for apartments.
Hyatt could not say whether the new hotel will be finished by Commissioning Week 2024. There’s no timeline for construction, however, the developers have begun applying for permits. Kristen Pironis, executive director of Visit Annapolis, praised the project for adding to the area’s “diverse inventory of accommodations.” The new hotel may help encourage visitors to “stay longer and visit more frequently,” she said in a statement.
