The prospect of an upscale, 50-room hotel in downtown Eatonton easily cleared city zoning hurdles this past week.
Boston-based Drew Company plans to renovate the old Hotel Eatonton at 108 N. Madison Ave., expand it, and manage the finished project. The original 1921 structure was last used as county administrative offices but has been sitting idle for a decade or so.
At a called meeting last Thursday, the city’s planning and zoning commission gave its approval for zero lot lines on two sides of the L-shaped property.
At the council’s regularly scheduled mid-month meeting Monday evening, three more variances were approved: lot coverage percentage, building height (to 50 feet, matching the existing structure’s height), and parking (17 spaces undercover, on-street, and possible negotiations with Farmers and Merchants Bank for night-time usage of some of its spaces).
“The economic impact over 10 years is going to be a pretty positive impact downtown,” council member Teresa Doster said in citing one study. “This is a fantastic project.” “I’m anxious to see some dirt turned,” Eatonton Mayor John Reid added.
Compared to the scope of other company projects in its four decades of existence, Drew’s Eatonton plans for a boutique hotel may seem unusual.
Much of the company’s early work centered on the reinvigoration of Boston’s Seaport District, then the Ronald Reagan Convention Center in Washington, D.C., and currently the construction of a 976-room, 46-story Hilton Signia hotel at the core of the Georgia World Trade Center “campus” in Atlanta. The Atlanta hotel will also serve nearby Mercedes-Benz Stadium and State Farm Arena.
Meanwhile, Austin Bell, Drew’s senior director and development manager who works out of the firm’s Atlanta office, pointed to the “visionary” outlook for reinvigorating properties that started in Boston.
“We look to get something that is about to take off. It’s kind of a company platform,” he said. “My boss and I came here, and she fell in love with the town and all that’s going on around it.”
Current plans call for “50 keys” (hotel speak for rooms in the 350-square-foot range), matching brickwork with the standing structure, reconfiguring the original structure’s 14 rooms into suites, installing a full-service restaurant with a connected roof-top bar, small “jewel box” retail offerings managed by the hotel, and a moderate- size meeting space (up to 100 people).
Completion of the project could take 18 to 24 months, including closing on the property sometime in the fall (probably October) with Putnam Development Authority, the property’s current owner; six months of preparing detailed drawings; eight to 12 months of construction, and another six months for testing, furnishing, and training of staff.