Are you pro- or anti-Hilton?
August 1, 2008
When construction began on the city-owned Hilton Convention Center Hotel two years ago, not everyone was gung ho about the new luxury venue.
Street vendors outside Camden Yards were forced to move their stands farther away from the ballpark, fans grumbled about the changed skyline view from the Oriole Park seats and the Orioles sued the city, claiming that hotel construction just outside the main entrance to Camden Yards created “an intolerable hazard for hundreds of thousands of pedestrians” by forcing them into narrow pathways or streets with heavy traffic.
The Orioles dropped the lawsuit soon after, when the two sides agreed that a 25-foot-wide covered walkway would be built next to the construction site on Howard Street to help with pedestrian traffic. But the team still remains tight-lipped on the issue, declining to comment this week on the Hilton Hotel’s completion.
But others around the sports complex are eagerly awaiting the boon they expect the hotel’s presence to bring. A spokeswoman for the Maryland Stadium Authority called the Hilton “our new best friend,” and Michael L. Gibbons, executive director of the Sports Legends Museum, said he’s “downright excited” about the possibilities the Hilton will create for the area and for the museum’s attendance.
“It will create casual pedestrian traffic, more unprecedented than anything we’ve seen around here on a day-to-day basis,” he said. “It will rival what we see on game days.”
The Hilton, which changed Oriole Park fan views of the historic Bromo Seltzer Tower to one that has been referred to by many as an eyesore, has also had some engineering adjustments to help it better fit in with its surrounding area. Designers have matched the brick at the base of the complex and the granite walkway stones to that of Camden Yards’ and have created a sightline from the convention center light rail stop that focuses riders on the ballpark entrance.
Do you think more should have been done to preserve the original view at the ballpark, or does the new hotel give Baltimore more than it takes away? Or do you absolutely hate it and nothing can be done to change your mind?
LIZ FARMER, Business Writer
Sphere: Related ContentMarylanders: Hotel let the bedbugs bite
March 31, 2008
As someone who will be sleeping in a hotel bed within the week, I just say a big “EWW” on behalf of travelers everywhere.
From WSJ.com:
A Manhattan judge has scratched a request for punitive damages in a bedbug case.
But the judge… let go forward the negligence claims of two Maryland tourists for bites they sustained during a two-night stay at the theater district’s Milford Plaza.
JACKIE SAUTER, Web Editor
Sphere: Related ContentBaltimore, the homeless and hotels
March 26, 2008
Wednesday, the city’s spending panel discussed the authorization of $60,000 to pay the hotel bills for 41 homeless Baltimoreans who have been living in a Quality Inn and 12 more homeless families who were living in the Ramada Inn since mid-December.
They were relocated there from encampments under the JFX because the city said they were creating a fire hazard, and the city’s “Code Blue” shelter had filled up and the weather was getting increasingly cold. They were originally slated to stay only until Jan. 23. The first leg of their stay, from Dec. 14 to Jan. 23, had a price tag of $125,000, which also came from city coffers.
When we here at the Daily Record noticed this item on the Board of Estimates’ meeting agenda, it got us thinking about these two very different, but very important types of developments: homeless shelters and hotels, and we decided to take a look at the numbers.
According to officials at the city’s Homeless Services offices, there are some 60 facilities in Baltimore, most of them run by nonprofits or city social services agencies, that serve the homeless. There are no city-run facilities to serve our roughly 3,000 homeless, but the city does contribute local, state, and federal grant money to these independent facilities.
Sphere: Related ContentHotelier Stephen Marx of Lifestyle HG
December 21, 2007
Hotelier Stephen Marx says he likes to take some time at the start of each day to gaze at the trees swaying outside of his Greenwich, Conn. home, to take in the expansive blue sky, and to meditate.
“I get up in the morning, I go out on my deck and I sit for 15 minutes and I just try to clear my mind, try to put my troubles away, get myself squared away emotionally, mentally for the day,” he said.
He doesn’t follow any particular spiritual tradition, doesn’t have a mantra or a guru, but Marx says his meditation contributes to his overall happiness and sense of balance.
In addition, Marx works out four times a week, tries to eat healthy foods and is a member of a men’s group that meets periodically to discuss spiritual and emotional matters.
“Sometimes it’s difficult for men to communicate their feelings,” he explained.
All of this is part and parcel of the ideas about wellness and balance espoused by Marx’s brand-new boutique hotel brand, Lifestyle HG, which has announced that it will open its newest franchise at 301 N. Charles St. in Baltimore some time in the next 16-17 months.
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