Hotel campus zone plans unveiled

Rendering of Hotel Campus Zone by Boggs and Partners. Redevelopment calls for Broadway to be extended to oceanfront

BY CHRISTINE VARNO

Staff Writer

The developer for the city of Long Branch's hotel campus redevelopment zone unveiled plans last week for the area that include extending South Broadway down to the oceanfront.

"Part of our plan and one of the most public kick-backs is opening South Broadway down to the ocean," said Steven Manis, vice president of Virginia-based developer Orr Partners, at the council workshop meeting April 25.

Manis unveiled preliminary plans for the expansion and reconstruction of the Ocean Place Resort & Spa on Ocean Boulevard and added that he hopes to have a developer's agreement with the city within the next 12 to 18 months.

Negotiations will include a contribution by the developers to the construction of a $55 million pier, which Manis said would be "our next-door neighbor."

Currently the hotel has ballrooms located on the site between the ocean and south Broadway, Manis explained, but plans call for the ballrooms to be "removed and relocated in order to put a street in."

The hotel campus zone, one of six redevelopment zones in the city, extends from Laird Street to Madison Avenue and from Ocean Boulevard to the oceanfront and the project would extend to a portion of land on Abbottsford Avenue.

Manis declined to project the total cost of the project, but said the plans will include the construction of a second tower, approximately 175,000 square feet of retail space, a complete renovation of the hotel and additional parking that will be "wrapped with ground-level retail."

He said it is too soon to estimate the number of rooms to be constructed in the second tower.

City Business Administra-tor Howard Woolley said at the meeting, "One of the biggest things is that the [hotel site] has four front edges on this property."

The Madison Avenue and Laird Street borders of the hotel were never treated as front edges of the project, Woolley explained.

"Now with what's happening to the north and south of the project, we want to integrate it into those neighborhoods," Woolley said. "Would this project happen without Pier Village and Beachfront North, no. Were it not for the progress achieved to date, this project would not be here."

Manis said that the expansion project will increase employment at the hotel by approximately 20 percent.

In March, the City Council approved resolution 93-06, authorizing the transfer of the developers rights for the zone from Tiburon Ocean Place, which owns the hotel, to Ocean Place Development.

According to the resolution, Tiburon Ocean Place entered into a joint venture with Orr-Partners to form Ocean Place Development, which would enable a "refinancing of the property and the establishment of an entity that is proposing a redevelopment plan" for the zone.

The proposed redevelopment plan will not include "any further eminent domain proceedings or property acquisition," according to the resolution.

The city originally entered into a developers agreement with Gem Holdings, Inc. in 1986 for construction of the Ocean Place Hilton Hotel and with the consent of the city, Gem Holding signed over its rights to Tiburon Ocean Place in 2000, according to the resolution.