Hotel hopeful for October opening

July 03, 2008 10:27 pm

— VALDOSTA — Fears that a struggling national economy and the tourist-driven segment of it are being impacted by the rising cost of fuel and other factors haven’t seemed to slow progress on local developers’ aims to continue the area’s surge as a key hotel destination along the I-75 corridor.
Valdosta, in fact, is set to gain one of several new hotels being built along I-75 exits by the fall. And partners in the firm that owns the hotel — A & M Hospitalities of Valdosta — are excited about the area’s ability to maintain adequate customer flows to sustain their business goals.
A & M partner David Motley says the new Hilton Garden Inn hopefully will open in October. Located at 1702 Gornto Rd. across from the Valdosta mall, the hotel’s seven floors make it the tallest hotel in the area and possibly the tallest building in Valdosta, Motley said.
A & M, whose partners also include Jane Motley (David’s wife) and Harish Alimchandani, recently survived a round before the Valdosta-Lowndes County Board of Zoning Appeals to be able to install the 110-foot tall sign that passersby can see hovering high into the air above the hotel.
The Hilton Garden Inn (HGI) is being built on a 3 acre-plus parcel bordered by Gornto and Ellis Drive, just behind the Flash Foods store and gas station that’s located at the corner of Gornto and North St. Augustine Road.
A & M also developed and owns the Hampton Inn and Suites on Norman Drive next to the James H. Rainwater Conference Center. Motley says the company’s intent originally was to build an HGI at that site.
But a market study presented to the Hilton company to justify an HGI five years ago didn’t pass muster at that time because Hilton officials didn’t see the required demographics, Motley said.
HGIs are geared towards business travelers, while Hampton Inn and Suites are designed more for vacationing families and tourists passing through. Hilton is headquartered in Palm Springs, Calif., but is doing more business from Memphis, Tenn. because of its central air travel connections. Hilton owns Hampton Inn and Suites, Motley said.
“We inquired in 2003 about building an HGI at what is now the Hampton Inn site, but Hilton didn’t think it was quite time for an HGI in Valdosta,” Motley said. “At that time, our initial plans had been geared for an HGI, and on the some of the original documents you can see the name Hilton Garden Inn. But when Hilton said not yet, we decided to build the Hampton Inn and Suites.”
The Hampton Inn has been a huge success for A & M, so much so that the company has added more rooms. Plus, five years later, Valdosta had grown to the extent that a re-inquiry to Hilton about putting an HGI here sailed through with corporate approval, Motley said.
A & M was able to show Hilton that the Hampton Inn is drawing a lot of business travelers. Combining data on local population and business growth — including a re-birthed Wild Adventures theme park, the annual Moultrie agricultural exposition, a new annual PGA golf tournament and growing regional business at the Rainwater Conference Center — made A & M’s second round for an HGI a breeze, Motley said.
“Valdosta has changed a lot in the past five years, and it was easy for Hilton officials to see that,” he said.
Rooms and suites at the Hampton Inn are priced a little bit lower than the same at HGIs. The Hampton Inn has been drawing a lot of family business, especially on weekends, Motley said.
“We think the HGI will attract some families as well, so we’re going to try to keep room prices at the new hotel as affordable as we can. They’ll be just a little higher than at the Hampton, which is normal for an HGI,” he said.
Hilton Garden Inns have been a growing product for the Hilton company, he added.
The HGI on Gornto Road will have 164 rooms on seven floors. The parking lot will be just off Ellis Drive and a main entrance will be on Gornto Road facing the Valdosta mall. The hotel will feature a restaurant, bar and lounge, and 4,000 square feet of meeting space for conferences, parties, weddings and other social events, Motley said.
“Some of the rooms at the HGI will be larger and considered suite type rooms, but this hotel is more designed for the business traveler,” he said. “That’s different than the Hampton Inn, where two-thirds of our rooms are suites.”

Signs, signs, everywhere there’s …
Valdosta’s drive to reverse years of a proliferation of signage abuses along the I-75 corridor and in town, to improve the aesthetic appeal of the community in a way that helps attract growth — not deter it — caught up with A & M when the firm began the permitting process for HGI signs last year.
A & M wanted to install a 110-foot tall sign on its property on Gornto and Ellis, but updated city ordinances and the location of other hotel signs in that area forced the company to go before the Valdosta-Lowndes County Board of Zoning Appeals to get a special exception that would allow the tall sign.
The company also applied for approval of signs on the hotel building and at entrance points, but didn’t fare as well in those categories with the appeals board during its Dec. 7, 2007 session, according to the minutes of the meeting.
The height of the sign aimed at attracting I-75 travelers is by right of ownership as long as the business is within 1,500 feet of the interstate, and was not an issue, said zoning appeals board member Mike Hill and City Manager Larry Hanson.
The issue with the tall sign was that it would be located closer than 500 feet to the next closest sign, so A & M requested a variance, the officials said.
Motley said the HGI property is located in a heavily developed area where prior development had allowed other property owners to get their signs up and still comply with the 500 foot distance requirement. But by the time A & M was ready to build the HGI, there was no way it could comply with the 500 foot distance rule.
A & M also requested the zoning appeals board to allow the HGI sign to have a face of 300 square feet instead of the allowed 250 square feet, mainly because Hilton does not make a 250 square foot face and it would cost much more to have one custom made to comply with that rule. But the zoning appeals board shot down that portion of the request.
The appeals board did allow a variance for A & M on the 500 foot distance requirement from other nearby signs at the BP station and Jolly Inn, however.
“That is the (zoning appeals board’s) prerogative and the city’s zoning staff was not opposed to that special exception,” Hanson said.
A & M also wanted to erect four 155-square-foot signs on each side of the hotel building, but the ordinance bases total allowable wall signage on the size of a wall’s linear feet.
The hotel has two long and two short walls, so the zoning appeals board convinced the company not to install a wall sign on one of the short walls to reduce the total wall signage and get it within ordinance requirements.
Motley said he plans to install low-lying monument type signs at the entrances of the hotel that won’t be unattractive, but appealing.
“We have road frontage on Ellis and Gornto, and there are benefits to the amount of signage you qualify for by having dual access points,” Motley said. “Plus we qualified for the additional interstate (high rise) sign because we’re in the interstate corridor. We felt we could justify it before the zoning board of appeals. These signs will be done in a very attractive manner, I assure you. Hilton Garden Inns are very attractive hotels.”

Photos

Paul Leavy/The Valdosta Daily Times