Hampton Hotel option replaces plans for condo

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Christine Cullen
Staff Writer

Despite worries that the building may not fit in with the design guidelines being developed for construction across the resort, the Ocean City Planning Commission approved the site plan for a new uptown hotel.
Plans to build a Hampton Inn and Suites hotel on 123rd Street at the former site of a Wendy’s fast food restaurant can now proceed, after the commission resolved some issues regarding parking and the design of the building and voted 6-0 to approve the plans.

The property, on the bayside between Dumser’s Dairyland and McDonalds, is owned by the Mandalay Cay company, which had planned to build a 41-unit multi-family condominium on the site. Instead, changing real estate conditions led the company to shift gears to an 82-unit hotel that would be part of the Hampton Inn chain.

“I think it’s a great idea to put a hotel or motel here, it’s better than condos any day of the week,” Commissioner Peck Miller said.

Apart from one minor issue to be cleared up regarding the size of the fire lane behind the building, Zoning Administrator Blaine Smith said the planning department had no problems with the site plan. The commission, however, wanted to look at two issues in particular before backing the project.

The hotel required 84 parking spaces, 82 for the hotel and two for the third-floor meeting room. But according to the site plan, only 83 spaces would be provided.

Commission Chairman Dr. Geoff Robbins wanted to know if the hotel rooms were actually suites, as the name of the hotel would suggest, as suites have different parking requirements than rooms. The applicant, Thomas Plotts, assured the commission the hotel’s units fall under the city’s definition of “rooms” and are only suites according to the Hampton Inn standards.

As for the missing parking space, Smith told the commission the Transportation Department has requested that a bus shelter be placed on the property, and he asked the commission for a one parking space credit to make up for the area lost to the bus shelter.

After some minor confusion as to whether the project was one parking space short, attorney Chris Palmer said the request would have to be made by the Board of Zoning Appeals. Plotts then explained that the space had been in the plans, but was removed when the bus shelter was added so that the project could keep the minimum required amount of landscaping, and in that case Palmer said the commission could make the exception.

The other issue raised by the commission related to the physical appearance of the building, which Plotts noted is tightly controlled by Hampton Inn guidelines. Robbins did not feel the building would fit in with the design guidelines the city is working to establish.

“With the new design standards on the way, this wouldn’t be allowed to be built,” he said. “If you take the words “Hampton Inn” off it and it’s a condominium, you wouldn’t accept it.”

Commissioner Lauren Taylor pointed out that the design guidelines have yet to be completed, let alone implemented, so at this point the commission has no power to deny the project based on this particular issue.

In the end, the commission voted unanimously to accept the site plan, with Commissioner Thomas Singman absent. Everybody agreed that the decision to build a hotel instead of more condominiums would have a positive impact on the city.

“This is so much better for that location than what they had,” Miller said.

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