CUYAHOGA FALLS: One major development has been delayed but another is speeding ahead.
City Council Planning Committee gave thumbs up Monday night to the site plan for a proposed Wallhouse Hotel, an 80-room, eight-story boutique hotel on the southeast corner of Portage Trail and Front Street that officials hope will inspire a downtown renaissance.
If council as a whole approves the project next week and barring unforeseen obstacles, ground could be broken this September, with the hotel opening in the fall of 2017.
The planning committee will also ask council next week to accept the delay of a Menards construction project.
The home improvement chain originally intended to open a new store on Graham Road this past spring. Now that the company has decided not to break ground until next year, a previously approved and time-limited site plan and tax abatement will need to be extended.
The local Wallhouse would be the third hotel in a small Ohio chain that also has boutiques in Walnut Creek and New Concord.
The $8.8 million investment will create 35 construction jobs with a payroll of about $1 million, then 35 full-time hotel jobs with another $1 million annual payroll, project consultant Susan Truby told council.
The bottom floors will offer retail space, and the top floor will feature a yet-to-be-named restaurant with a bird’s-eye view of the area.
River Falls Property purchased the land from the city last year. Alan Burge Architecture of Akron is the architect. The hotel operator will be Nivea Hospitality.
The hotel will be a dramatic addition to Front Street, where most buildings are two stories. Alan Burge told council that the two bottom floors of the hotel have been designed with stone and mason to fit in with the existing buildings.
Planning Director Fred Guerra said he expects the hotel to stimulate development along Front Street, a struggling pedestrian mall currently closed to traffic. The city is pursuing plans for returning two-way traffic to that portion of Front Street, something that hotel developers say they are counting on.
“It’ll be a great addition,” Guerra said, “and it’s going to help in promoting other things downtown.”
Council President Mary Ellen Pyke complimented the hotel team for making several changes requested by the city, saying the hotel is the “first big building” in a new future for the district and it was important to set the right tone.
The high-rise restaurant alone “will be a destination point,” she said.
Meanwhile, city officials are also optimistic that a long-awaited Menards development will have its day.
Area residents have been waiting since 2014 for the store to break ground, when it was originally suggested the store would fit into the city’s new Portage Crossing shopping development.
Instead, the store purchased the former Giant Eagle property on Graham Road, a 10-acre parcel it acquired for $1.4 million, and demolished the old grocer to make room for a 172,740-square-foot building, with expectations of a grand opening in the spring of 2016.
The company announced a delay last year, saying it was due to a chainwide redesign of building interiors.
Then in May, it announced another delay on all new construction in the country, blaming presidential-year politics.
The company has said it expected to employ 40 full-time and 80 part-time workers with an annual payroll of $2.25 million. Total investment in the new retail space would be about $21 million.
Council is expected to approve a year extension on the site plan and tax abatement plan that are set to expire.
Company spokesman Tom O’Neal said the company now expects to break ground in May of 2017, with a story opening in May of 2018.
Paula Schleis can be reached at 330-996-3741 or pschleis@thebeaconjournal.com. Follow her on Twitter at http://twitter.com/paulaschleis.