A limited-service hotel planned for the Anaheim site near the Disneyland Resort that once held The Boogie nightclub appears to be getting much taller than initially envisioned.
Rockville, Md.-based hotel operator Choice Hotels International Inc. said this month that it signed an agreement with franchise partner Nexus Companies in Santa Ana to build a Cambria Hotel & Suites in Anaheim on a stretch of long-open land near the intersection of Katella Avenue and the Santa Ana (I-5) Freeway.
The 1721 S. Manchester Ave. site previously was home to The Boogie, a cowboy music-themed venue that once was the largest nightclub in Orange County.
The nightclub closed a decade ago, and the property has been largely unused since, other than as ancillary parking for Disney, whose theme parks are about a mile away.
I first reported on Nexus’ proposed hotel at the 6-acre site in May, prior to a hotel brand announcement.
City filings at the time showed the 350-room hotel would be five stories.
Updated city documents show the project will be 12 stories with about the same number of rooms, in addition to 15,000 square feet of retail and restaurant space.
The project will be the largest Cambria hotel by room count to date, according to Chief Executive Steve Joyce.
Cambria hotels is a business travel and leisure brand launched a few years ago. There are 25 existing Cambria hotels and another 30 in development.
One of the projects in the works is a 122-room property near John Wayne Airport in Irvine that’s scheduled to go up on the site of a former industrial building.
The new Anaheim location, in addition to planned hotels near LA Live and LAX Airport in Los Angeles, is “consistent with our strategy of growing the Cambria (brand) in high-profile locations within the top travel markets across the country,” Joyce told analysts this month.
It typically costs between $220,000 and $250,000 per room to develop a midrise or high-rise Cambria hotel in urban locations, Joyce said.
A midpoint of that range would put an $82.3 million cost on the Anaheim project, which is scheduled to open by November 2018—around the time the new Star Wars Land attraction at Disneyland will debut—and run 230,000 square feet.
It will feature “a palm-tree-lined, California-themed outdoor swimming pool, an outdoor movie screening wall, meeting space and a fitness center,” according to the developers.
“We think it will be a wonderful addition to the Anaheim Resort District as the number of visitors to this popular area continues to rise,” said Nexus President Cory Alder in a statement.
The proposed Nexus-Choice project is one of several hotels planned for the Anaheim resort area, the 1,100-acre district that includes Disneyland Resort and Anaheim Convention Center.
The area has a mix of nearly 80 luxury, economy and family-friendly hotels totaling almost 15,000 rooms, according to city figures. It holds about 70% of all the hotel rooms in the city.
Other hotel projects in development would add another 3,200 or so rooms to the area, according to city data.
SJC Relaunch
Taylor Morrison is preparing to take the wraps off its latest high-end housing project in South Orange County.
The Scottsdale, Ariz.-based builder will open models for the Pacifica San Juan development in San Juan Capistrano on Aug. 27.
Its project will hold 318 homes, which will join 98 homes that were built at the one-time SunCal Cos. development prior to the recession.
Taylor Morrison and its financial partners bought the undeveloped part of the project last year for an estimated $150 million.
Pacifica San Juan is on a bluff near the Santa Ana (I-5) Freeway overlooking San Juan Capistrano and Dana Point.
New homes will run from 2,587 square feet to 4,326 square feet and are priced from “the low $1 millions,” according to the builder, which also is building high-end homes at the Sea Summit development in San Clemente—another former SunCal property that previously was called Marblehead and that’s next to the new outlet mall there.
Sea Summit has had about 35 sales since it opened late last year. Taylor Morrison opened another set of model homes a few weeks ago at the Indigo project that run up to 5,544 square feet and are priced starting at about $2 million.
