On Dec. 10, the New Orleans City Planning Commission unanimously voted to recommend denial of the conditional use and size waivers that would have allowed a 7-story, 92,421-square foot hotel in the 600 block of Elysian Fields Ave., right in the middle of historic Faubourg Marigny. The applicant, 621 Elysian Fields Group, LLC, requested an alarming 24-foot height variance above the 50-foot height limit allowed for that area.
The CPC staff report recommended denial of the application citing compatibility in scale as a primary issue. The report outlined how the proposal does not meet any of the standards for approval in City’s Comprehensive Zoning Ordinance and that it is also inconsistent with the New Orleans’ Master Plan. A few commissioners indicated that while they were not necessarily opposed to a hotel at this location, they were not able to recommend approval of a project that was so out of scale with its surroundings.
The PRC spoke in opposition to the proposal, joining a crowd of concerned residents and members of neighborhood organizations including the Faubourg Marigny Improvement Association, which has collected hundreds of petition signatures against the oversized project. A large group was also present in favor of the proposal, although most of them chose not to make any public comments and instead ceded their time to the developer, who described four iterations of the project that have been considered over the last few years. While the developers have decreased the number of guest accommodations from 150 to approximately 130, the massive size of the building has remained constant, albeit with some rearrangement of its massing.
Architectural design and details are often touted as the main appeal of a historic district. But scale is an equally important aspect of a neighborhood’s integrity. Surrounded primarily by residential shotguns and Creole cottages, there are no amount of exterior design tweaks that could camouflage a project of this size.
Next, the application will be heard by the New Orleans City Council. We urge District C Councilman Freddie King, and the rest of the council, to follow the recommendation of the CPC and deny the conditional use and variances for this out of scale hotel project.
