Developers of Winslow Hotel drop plan to add low-cost studio units

The developers of the proposed Winslow Hotel have abandoned plans to add 11 workforce housing units to the facility.

Bruce Anderson, an architect for the project, said the changes would have required going back to the city’s planning commission.

It was a delay that the developer did not want to endure.

“After fully understanding the additional process required to add up to 11 workforce housing units inside the volume of the hotel, we concluded that the timing of this additional review this was triggering was too long,” Anderson said in an email Tuesday to the Review.

“So, we withdrew the housing component from the project officially, in favor of a quicker process to reach the hearing examiner,” he added.

“I’m expecting the review process might now conclude this year, rather than extending into next year,” Anderson added.

Madison Avenue Development has proposed constructing an 87-room hotel on two lots in downtown Winslow. The recent changes included the addition of 11 studio units for low-income workers.

The Winslow Hotel project includes a restaurant and bar, banquet and meeting space, a landscaped courtyard, and parking underground and near the hotel building.

Bainbridge city officials announced last Friday that Madison Avenue Development submitted revisions to the hotel plan in October, and added that officials planned to send the revised project back to the city’s planning commission after a review by city planning staff.

The city opened a two-week comment period on the hotel Friday, Nov. 1.

Updated information for the hotel project said the revised development was expected to add 808 vehicle trips each day after the building is finished. The hotel itself would add 727 daily trips, while the 11 new low-income units in the project would add 81.

The proposal has been controversial with some Bainbridge residents, who have raised fears about increased traffic and noise downtown. Some opponents have also said the project is out of scale with Winslow, while project supporters have noted that other downtown development — namely Town & Country Market and The Pavilion — are larger in size and generate much more traffic than the proposed hotel.

In a recommendation earlier this year, the planning commission said the original plans for the hotel should be rejected because the hotel was too big for downtown Winslow, and added that the hotel was not being built for the benefit of Bainbridge residents, and also noted the project would add more traffic and noise to Winslow Way.