Site plan for university’s hotel and conference center

What do the Metropolitan at Midtown, Aloft at the EpiCentre and Ritz-Carlton in Chicago have to do with University City?

Three companies that helped create or operate each are working with UNC Charlotte to build its hotel and conference center at the JW Clay Boulevard LYNX Station.

Learn more at 6:30 pm May 7, at a community meeting on the project at the university’s PORTAL building.

Facility near JW Clay Blvd Station could open in 2020

The university and its foundation are moving forward on design work for the hotel and conference center, to be located on 11.4 acres at the corner of North Tryon Street and JW Clay Boulevard.

Niles Sorensen, president of the UNC Charlotte Foundation, said that the university hopes to see construction start in early 2019, with completion in late summer 2020.

“Once completed, the full-service UNC Charlotte-branded Marriott hotel will provide 226 rooms and a 15,000-sq.-ft. state-of-the-art conference center,” Chancellor Phil Dubois wrote in his monthly Fast Five Update on April 2.

The Foundation recently submitted a request to rezone 4.4 acres at North Tryon Street and JW Clay Boulevard for the project. The community meeting on May 7 is a required step in the rezoning process.

“We are excited the University is investing in bringing another anchor to Charlotte and University City. Their design will fully embrace our efforts to make the JW Clay a walkable urban center,” said Tobe Holmes, planning and development director for University City Partners.

Enticing new details

A report given to the UNC Charlotte Board of Trustees in February and the site plan filed recently with the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Planning Department provide some enticing additional details about the future hotel and conference center. Among them:

Development partners for the project have impressive resumes

The principals of Stormont Hospitality Group led the development of Raleigh Marriott City Center.

Stormont Hospitality Group has completed more than $2 billion in hotel development projects, including the Atlanta Airport Marriott Gateway, the Raleigh Marriott Center and Aloft Charlotte Uptown at the EpiCentre. Website
Cooper Carry, a national design firm, worked with developer Peter Pappas to create Charlotte’s Metropolitan at Midtown. Cooper Carry provided design services for the architecture, interior design and planning for the 14-acre center just south of uptown. Website
Sage Hospitality manages 75 hotels and over 440,000 square feet of meeting space, including the Ritz-Carlton Chicago and Hilton Charlotte Executive Park. Website

A glimpse of how it may look

Details from the site plan show that most the site will be developed, as is typical with transit-oriented development. The requested zoning, Transit-Oriented Development-M, allows a mix of high-intensity office, civic, entertainment and institutional uses near a transit station. Building height is not stated directly in the site plan, but the zoning allows a maximum building height of 120 feet, or roughly 10 stories.

A pedestrian walkway already links the JW Clay Blvd Station to the future hotel property.

The preliminary site plan includes a sketch of the main elements. The sketch and written details show a grassy area between North Tryon Street and the buildings, along with 8-foot-wide sidewalks and planting strips along North Tryon, Clay Boulevard and Robert D. Snyder Road.

The main entrance will be from Robert D. Snyder Road.

One key element is already complete: the overhead walkway between the JW Clay Boulevard station and the future hotel and conference center.

Learn more and help shape the project on May 7

The community meeting on May 7 will include both a presentation on the project and the opportunity for the public to make comments and suggestions.

These public comments are part of the public record and will be considered by planning staff and the Charlotte City Council during the rezoning process.

• Time and Place: The meeting will start at 6:30 pm in Room 242 of the PORTAL Building, 9319 Robert D. Snyder Road, beside the proposed hotel/conference center site. Directions and More event details
• Parking: Limited parking will be available in the surface parking lot across Robert D. Snyder Road (Lot CRI 2). If that lot is full, additional parking is available for a fee in the adjacent CRI parking deck.
• More information: If you have questions about the project, contact representatives of the rezoning petitioner, Bridget Grant (704-331-2379) and Jeff Brown (704-331-1144), both with Moore & Van Allen.
• Planning documents: Click here to read and download rezoning documents for Petition 2018-047 at the Planning Department website (ignore the location shown on the website for this property; as of May 3, it was incorrect).