MADEIRA BEACH, Fla. \u2014\u00a0Madeira Beach city commissioners are scheduled to take a final vote on Wednesday to approve a new $150 million hotel development in the heart of John\u2019s Pass Village.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt’s the biggest investment that you’ll see in John’s Pass,\u201d said Bill Karns, JPV Hotel Property partner. \u201cThere’s no branded hotels along the beach here.\u201d<\/p>\n
Karns said the proposed six-story, 87-room hotel will be part of the Marriott Tribute Collection, which are properties geared at telling a story for a specific area. The design plans include 7,550 square feet of retail, 3,350 square feet for a first-floor restaurant, 1,000 square feet for a first-floor caf\u00e9, 3,900 square feet for a rooftop restaurant with a pool, and 2,800 square feet of event space.<\/p>\n
The hotel will be a single building with compatible village architecture to visually fit with the popular historic tourist district, according to Karns.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt’s going to look like it’s been here for a long time,\u201d he said. \u201cThe Place Architecture did a great job of capturing the vision of John’s Pass. A lot of these buildings were built in the \u201830s and \u201840s.\u201d<\/p>\n
Karns said he spent years buying 15 parcels, which have been used as parking lots, to get enough land to build a hotel. The 1.4 acres currently has 180 parking spaces. The proposed hotel will have more than 264 parking spots in a six-story garage that will be hidden from street view at the center of the hotel. An agreement with Madeira Beach states that the hotel can\u2019t charge more than $1 above the city\u2019s standard parking rate.<\/p>\n
John\u2019s Pass is one of Pinellas County\u2019s top tourist destinations, which can make finding a place to park challenging during peak times. Pinellas Beaches Chamber of Commerce CEO Barry Rubin said the village has also been lacking in upscale hotel rooms.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere’s not hotels of this scope and scale,\u201d he said. That’s what the tourists are after now. The motels from the \u201850s are no longer desired by most travelers.\u201d<\/p>\n
The city has agreed to allow developers to build on a 3,360-square-foot section of Fisherman\u2019s Alley, which divided the parcels in two, in exchange for a 16,000 square foot easement for the extension of Pelican Lane from 129th Avenue to the boardwalk. Karns said they\u2019ll also pay to build 10-foot wide sidewalks, a park with restrooms and a big event stage.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt’s going to really become a hub of activity here in Johns Pass,\u201d he said. \u201cI want this to be the shiny penny in Madeira Beach, something we can all be proud of and enjoy.\u201d<\/p>\n
Madeira Beach city commissioners unanimously passed a re-zoning and development agreement during a first reading on June 10. At that time, there was no public opposition to the project. In order for the hotel to be fully approved, there must be another public hearing, and the ordinances must pass a second vote with a super-majority.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Karns is so confident city leaders want to see the project come to fruition that he and his partners decided to move forward with the second vote, scheduled for July 8that 6 p.m., despite one city commissioner being on vacation.<\/p>\n
\u201cI’m confident that we\u2019ll succeed and get a 4-0 vote, which I need all four,\u201d he said. “The community has embraced it in such a way because they’re tired of seeing\u2026 an acre-and-a-half of unpaved parking lots.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Karns said if approved, he hopes to have the new John\u2019s Pass hotel open by the fall of 2028.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MADEIRA BEACH, Fla. \u2014\u00a0Madeira Beach city commissioners are scheduled to take a final vote on Wednesday to approve…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":331378,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[274,2968,115,596,202,204,203,199,201,200,135,278,835],"class_list":["post-331377","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-st-petersburg","tag-app-top-stories","tag-josh-rojas","tag-news","tag-pinellas-county","tag-st-pete","tag-st-pete-headlines","tag-st-pete-news","tag-st-petersburg","tag-st-petersburg-headlines","tag-st-petersburg-news","tag-tampa","tag-top-stories","tag-vod"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331377","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=331377"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331377\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/331378"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=331377"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=331377"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=331377"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}