City Council discusses plans for new Hotel Cheval
Proposed outside cafe and crosswalk
Proposed Hotel Cheval II, across the street from the original, could permanently eliminate over 1000 square feet of public right of way, according to a city staff report
–The Paso Robles City Council held a public hearing and discussion at its Aug. 15 meeting to consider proposals in an application from the owner of Hotel Cheval to build a second hotel across the street from the current Pine Street location. The proposal for the second 20-room luxury hotel, Hotel Cheval II, includes a pool, an outside cafe, and an underground parking garage to be accessed from Railroad Street. The proposed design would use about 1,000 square feet of public right of away.
Topographic issues related to the underground parking mean that the cafe and access to the hotel need to be raised, according project designers. The raised feature would include steps, a disabled access ramp, railings and the café, which would reduce the width of the public sidewalk from 10 feet to five and half feet. The staff report to the council said that currently, “outside cafe seating in the city is temporary use. The seating and railing can be removed and the sidewalk can be restored for public right of way. In the case of the hotel expansion, the sidewalk use would last the life of the project.”
Two of six public parking spaces in front of the new hotel would be eliminated. The four remaining spaces would be moved south on Pine Street. Mayor Steve Martin said the underground parking garage would provide 34 parking spaces, some of which were supposed to be available for public parking to offset the loss of the two parking spaces and include parking for a new restaurant. Martin said the proposal, as presented to the council wasn’t clear about how parking in the underground garage would be differentiated or if the “total parking added would cover the spaces.” Martin said the project design, as presented, would narrow both Pine Street and the sidewalk in front of the hotels.
The council sent the matter back to staff, directing that additional options be developed that would include reducing the size of the encroachment into public right of way, increasing diagonal parking on the street frontages, converting Railroad Street to one-way with diagonal parking and refer all developed options back to the Paso Robles Planning Commission.
The applicant for the project is “Hotel Cheval 2, LLC”, represented by C.J. Horstman at MW Architects. The hotel owner is Robert Gilson.
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