By Ashley Fletcher Frampton
aframpton@scbiznews.com
Published March 30, 2011

Charleston Harbor Resort and Marina, located at Patriots Point, is advancing plans for a new, 92-room hotel that would include a rooftop restaurant and bar.

Construction could start this fall on the project, which would be adjacent to the resort’s existing facilities on the Mount Pleasant side of the harbor.

The project would expand the amount of development that exists on the 370 acres Patriots Point Development Authority owns on the harbor. It also would increase revenue for the authority, which operates the Patriots Point Naval and Maritime Museum.

Click to see a full-size PDF of the hotel rendering.

Charleston Harbor Resort and Marina representatives, who are working with Mount Pleasant town officials to get their plans approved, discussed conceptual details with the Patriots Point Development Authority board on Tuesday.

Effectively, they were asking for their landlord’s blessing before asking the town of Mount Pleasant for variances on height and buffer standards. Great American Life Insurance Co., which is developing the hotel, has about 36 acres under lease from Patriots Point through 2096.

The hotel expansion, which would occupy about 7 acres, is separate from recent discussions among Patriots Point leaders about increasing the intensity of development on the waterfront land.

Under the Great American Life Insurance Co.’s lease, additional development always has been allowed and expected, said Mac Burdette, executive director of Patriots Point.

The proposed new hotel would connect to the existing 130-room hotel by a breezeway, said Glen Deal, landscape architect with Seamon Whiteside & Associates. It will have a main pool, a more private pool area with cabanas, and a tiki bar with a lawn for events. A 170- to 180-space parking lot is planned as well.

Developers are asking the town to raise its height limit for the project from 60 feet to 80.

Oliver Rooskens, general manager for Brothers Property Management Group, a subsidiary of Great American Life Insurance Co., said the building is planned to be only a few feet higher than the current limit. But his company is seeking the 80-foot limit for all of its leased property at Patriots Point because that is the maximum set for other developments on the Mount Pleasant side of Charleston harbor, he said.

Billy Craver, attorney for Patriots Point, said at Tuesday’s meeting that the leaseholder plans additional structures on adjacent land. Rooskens, however, declined to detail those plans, saying they will depend on the economic climate.

Rooskens said plans call for the new hotel to open in the first quarter of 2013.

Under its lease, Great American Life Insurance Co. pays Patriots Point a flat fee for its undeveloped land and a percentage of revenue for developed parcels, Burdette said. The development would likely mean more money for Patriots Point.

The company now pays about $30,000 per month for its undeveloped parcels, Burdette said. It’s too soon to estimate what the company would pay once the hotel is built and operating.

Members of the development authority board, as property owners, gave the developer the green light on Tuesday to seek variances from the town.

Reach Ashley Fletcher Frampton at 843-849-3129.