Plans to erect a mid-rise hotel on an empty lot overlooking downtown Atlanta’s marquee greenspace appear to finally be gaining traction.
High End Investment, a Houston-based developer, has applied for building permits with the City of Atlanta to construct a Residence Inn by Marriott at 355 Centennial Olympic Park Drive, a former gravel parking lot that’s been fenced-off and sparingly used for several years.
As Bisnow Atlanta reports, High End’s plans now call for a 14-story building with 188 rooms on the .8-acre site. That would be a reduction of five stories from 2021 designs, but with three more hotel rooms.
The .8-acre, corner hotel site just north of the World of Coca-Cola and other Centennial Olympic Park attractions. Google Maps
As designed by Niles Bolton Associates architects, the 190,000-square-foot building would include a 63,000-square-foot parking garage. A High End official told Bisnow the firm is bullish on the hotel’s prospects downtown, and that the project would be the company’s first in Atlanta.
Whether more than 4,000 square feet of retail at the street, like 8,000 square feet of rooftop deck space, is still in the works isn’t clear.
High End has had difficulty securing a construction loan, given current economic conditions, but now has commitments for that debt, though nothing has been finalized, the company’s managing member, Barkat Ali, told the website.
As shown in 2021, the proposal at 355 Centennial Olympic Park Drive NW—when it was expected to rise 19 stories. Niles Bolton Associates, via City of Atlanta Planning Department/WNA
Located diagonal from the park’s north end, near Georgia Aquarium, the hotel building would stand three stories shorter than Kaplan Residential’s Generation Atlanta apartments next door. That 17-story project finished construction in summer 2020, offering 336 rentals, and was sold the following year for a record sum for downtown.
A 10-story Candlewood Suites was once briefly planned for the same corner site two years ago, but the COVID-19 pandemic scuttled that idea. High End paid $3.8 million for the parcel, which had traded for $10.5 million in pre-recession 2008, according to Fulton County property records.
How the Residence Inn by Marriott was planned to look from the northeast corner of downtown's marquee greenspace, per 2021 renderings. Niles Bolton Associates, via City of Atlanta Planning Department/WNA
The hotel wouldn’t be the only new hospitality venture at the park’s edge.
The 22-story Margaritaville resort condo building by Wyndham Destinations, also fronting Centennial Olympic Park Drive, opened last year with 200 suites and two floors of retail near SkyView Atlanta.
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