Lack of parking stalls plans for newest downtown hotel

December 12, 2018 | 3:00 am

Updated December 11, 2018 | 8:30 pm

The downtown parking garage. | Photo by AP Imagery

Construction on the newest downtown hotel will have to wait until a parking issue for the future hotel has been resolved. As for now, city officials and Gulfstream Development are working to come up with a solution for the parking issues that precede development for the new hotel.

While a chain has yet to commit to Gulfstream, the new hotel is slated to be built on W. 2nd Street, across from the Owensboro Convention Center.

Ed Ray, chief operating officer with Gulfstream Commercial Services, said there’s little information to share about the new hotel because of the parking issue.

“[We’re] still working on a parking plan with the city. That’s the most important part,” Ray said.

Mayor Tom Watson said there’s some land in downtown Owensboro that’s been owned by one family for decades, making it difficult for the city to propose a deal to purchase. Understandably, Watson said, the family doesn’t want to sell the property.

According to Watson, this land is being taxed at a lower rate than downtown property purchased in more recent years. The value for downtown property skyrocketed after development began, Watson said. Both aspects — the family’s lineage in owning the land, and owning it at a very low cost in comparison to current prices — make it difficult to encourage those landowners to compromise with city officials and downtown developers in selling their property.

“There’s a real imbalance of what these two owners with lots next to each other are actually paying in PVA (Property Value Administrator) costs,” Watson said. “And so that makes it difficult then to try and say, ‘OK, we’re going to propose this on this piece of land that costs $10,000 an acre, and over here it’s $2,000 an acre, but this guy doesn’t want to sell.’”

While the problem is making it difficult to move forward with projects, Watson said the issue is nothing that other cities haven’t seen when developing their own downtowns.

“It’s a complex problem, but it’s a problem every community has that tries to redevelop their downtown to have enough assets to create parking,” Watson said.

Ray, who was the former city attorney before taking his position at Gulfstream, said accessible parking is important for future growth in downtown Owensboro.

“Parking is certainly a key factor in continuing the progress everyone has made thus far in revitalizing the entire downtown,” Ray said. “Both the public and private sector need to be aligned in the next phase of the process.”

However, there are also other factors to consider in pushing Owensboro’s downtown to its fullest potential, Ray says. Affordable housing in the downtown area is one of Ray’s focuses in bringing more life and energy to the area.

“We have a beautiful and well thought out riverfront. We have corporate presence in our downtown. We have entertainment and restaurant venues, but we are significantly lacking in well-placed affordable urban housing,” Ray said. “Young families, millennials, seniors and college students want to live in accessible locations with quick and easy access to everything our downtown has to offer. Downtown residential living is the key to sustainability and continuing with the initiatives that everyone has worked so hard to achieve over the last decade.”

Ray believes that the new hotel in downtown Owensboro, which has been speculated to feature a possible restaurant and stores inside its walls, will entice more residents to move to the downtown area.

“Our planned hotel in residential development will be the first step toward achieving residential density downtown, but that can only be achieved if public parking expands from its current footprint,” Ray said. “The mayor and city officials are working hard to add additional parking locations, which will set the stage for residential development to thrive where it is needed most.”

December 12, 2018 | 3:00 am

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