Remember this Middletown hotel proposed in 2018? It's finally set to go before Zoning Board
MIDDLETOWN — A hotel proposal on Wave Avenue that's been on the agenda of the Zoning Board of Review for over three years finally will be discussed on Tuesday, Oct. 4, during a special meeting scheduled to start at 6 p.m.
The proposal by brothers Harry and Peter Kyriakides, longtime hoteliers and owners of several local properties including the Atlantic Beach Hotel & Suites next door on Wave Avenue, would entail knocking down Rusty’s Bar and Grille and two cottages adjacent to it to make way for a four-story, 23-unit hotel with a one-way driveway and 27 parking spots.
The project requires a special-use permit due to its location in a Limited Business Zone and Zone I of the Watershed Protection District, and would cut into the 260-hotel room cap mandated by the zoning of the Atlantic Beach District Overlay established in 2021.
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Attorney David Martland first brought the proposal to the board on behalf of Atlantic Beach Suites II LLC in April 2018, and told The Daily News at the time he didn’t expect work to begin until 2019 at the earliest.
“It’s a good project and one that is designed and laid out in a way to fit seamlessly into the neighborhood,” Martland said back then. “There’s a lot going on there, and we’re looking to continue that momentum.”
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That momentum carried through to January 2019, when the Planning Board gave initial approval of the development plan review and a positive advisory opinion for the special-use permit request to the Zoning Board of Review.
The town's Conservation Commission submitted a statement in support of the development, saying it would not negatively affect the drinking water supply in nearby Easton’s Pond.
The Zoning Board of Review meeting on March 26, 2019, included an array of experts on engineering, architecture, traffic and real estate who spoke on behalf of the project, as well as five Middletown residents opposed to the plan. After nearly four hours of testimony, the item was continued to a future meeting without reaching a conclusion.
The matter was pushed back eight more times, to February 2020, when the applicant asked for another continuance until April 2020 in order to re-advertise the petition.
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One letter of opposition, sent by Bird Jones and Bushnell Harry of Tuckerman Avenue, stated a decision to approve the special-use permit would establish a precedent of “an overabundance of hotels” in a limited business district.
The letter pointed out that the Zoning Board in 2018 granted 27 of 29 requested variances concerning district dimensional regulations and yard regulations: “The long-term effect of this trend is to negate the Zoning Ordinance by making the frequency of the positive variance decision the rule of standard," the letter stated.
According to public records, the Zoning Board of Review did not meet in April or May of 2020. It’s not clear what effect the COVID-19 pandemic had on the timeline of this particular permit request, among many other municipal processes.
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The Zoning Board of Review did resume its meetings starting in June 2020, but the petition of Atlantic Beach Suites II, LLC wasn’t raised again until the board’s Sept. 28, 2021 meeting.
According to the meeting minutes, “The petition … was referred to the Planning Board & has to be re-advertised. David P. Martland, Esq., made the request on behalf of the owner. The case was continued to the Oct 26, 2021 meeting."
The case was continued again to January 2022, when the board noted the petition was being re-advertised to the community in the residential areas adjacent to Wave and Aquidneck avenues.
This prevailed until the present, bringing to bear the special meeting scheduled for 6 p.m. on Oct. 4 at Town Hall (and available as a livestream online).
This article originally appeared on Newport Daily News: Middletown RI: 23-room hotel proposed for Wave Avenue to be reviewed
